Liverpool City Council is aiming to have a project team in place by the summer that will come up with a new masterplan for New Chinatown – after almost a decade of delay. Tony McDonough reports
Liverpool City Council will put together a project team within weeks to come up with fresh plans for the New Chinatown site.
In late 2015 developer North Point Global unveiled plans for a £200m at the 4.55-acre Great George Street site, a gateway to the city’s historic Chinatown. They included 600 homes, 80,000 sq ft of office space, a hotel and commercial space.
However, the development never came to fruition. With the backing of £10m in grants from Liverpool City Region Combined Authority, the city council acquired the site in November 2024.
At that time, Cllr Nick Small, Liverpool City Council’s Cabinet Member for Growth and Economy, said: “The acquisition of the stalled Great George Street development is a hugely significant step in resetting the story of this major gateway site.
“It’s proximity to the Baltic Triangle, which is undergoing huge change with plans afoot to radically upgrade the transport infrastructure there, means the future development of the Great George Street site is of critical importance to the city.”
Now the council is to push on with a plan to bring forward a new development. Via the Crown Commercial Services framework it is tendering for a multi-disciplinary team to draw up an outline business case and fresh masterplan.
It aims to have the team in place by the summer and is then “looking to progress at pace the delivery of the site”. If an outline business plan is delivered by August the city council’s cabinet will be asked to approve it in the autumn.
The company that owned the site before December, The Great George Street Project Limited, entered administration in February 2022.
Since the administration, the City Council worked with the company’s administrators, Cowgills and Farleys Solicitors to try to finalise the acquisition.
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Due to the complexity associated with the long leases on the site and the administration of the company, the sale to the city council had to be approved by the High Court. Approval was obtained on Friday, November 15 and the sale completed two weeks later.
The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government and the Combined Authority (LCRCA) have supported the Council’s approach, with an allocation of funding to complete the purchase and bring forward development options for the site.
