Retail/leisure
The central mall
leading to the cinema
block
Town centre revival
Financial woes and the continuing
rise of online shopping have forced
numerous household names in
the retail sector to close down
in recent years, leading to grim forecasts
about the viability of the traditional high
street and town centre malls.
Whether the forecasts are correct,
only time will tell, but a number of towns
and cities up and down the country are
still investing in new retail and leisure
complexes, specifically designed to become
destinations to regenerate town centres and
woo shoppers.
An example is Rochdale Riverside,
which forms one of the final parts of a
£250M investment package, which has been
transforming the town centre beyond all
recognition since 2011.
Other schemes which have been
delivered as part of this ambitious
regeneration programme include a new
customer service centre, a library and
council building known as Number One
Riverside (see NSC June 2012), the new
Rochdale Leisure centre, Rochdale Sixth
Form College, (recently rated outstanding
by Ofsted), and the award-winning river
re-opening project.
Rochdale Riverside includes 18,500m2
of steel-framed retail and leisure
accommodation, with approximately 24 new
shops, restaurants and a six-screen cinema.
It is hoped that this £80M development,
with a central pedestrian street as a key
feature, will transform the retail and
entertainment offering in the town and
encourage further inward investment.
Main contractor Willmott Dixon took
possession of the site at the end of February
2018 and has been busy mobilising and
engaging sub-contractors, with around
£21m likely to be spent with Greater
Manchester companies over the course of
the two-year build.
“The site had previously been occupied
by a bus station which had been demolished
before we came on site,” explains Willmott
Dixon Project Manager Andy Howarth.
“Our first task was to remediate the entire
site and then raise the ground level in order
to guard against potential flooding from the
nearby River Roch.”
Because of the project’s town centre
location a number of logistical challenges
have had to be overcome. Access to the site
has been altered a few times to take into
account neighbouring premises, while the
road layout
had to be redesigned.
A road originally crossed the
site and this has been closed and ripped
up, while another route, between the
construction plot and the site compound
has been maintained to allow access to the
adjacent existing shopping centre.
“A huge amount of services, beneath the
old road and serving our neighbours also
had to be diverted,” adds Mr Howarth.
Steelwork contractor Hambleton Steel
was able to begin its erection programme
late last summer, with the work split into
three main phases to allow other trades
to clad and fit out areas which would
otherwise become inaccessible. The
project’s initial steel design was done by
Curtins, but Hambleton Steel were later
appointed on a design and build contract
by Willmott Dixon.
Hambleton Steel subsequently valueengineered
the steelwork, and incorporated
a few design changes that had arisen
because of various client wishes.
Overall, the Riverside scheme consists of
five steel-framed structures, a three-storey
cinema block, two retail blocks known as
north and south which are separated by
the pedestrian thoroughfare, a two-storey
Marks & Spencer anchor store and a threelevel
car park.
In order to allow the site to be
constructed in a sequential manner,
Hambleton is erecting the steel in a west to
east direction, starting at the point nearest
Steel construction is playing a vital role in Rochdale’s ambitious
multi-million pound Riverside regeneration scheme. Martin
Cooper reports.
FACT FILE
Rochdale Riverside
Main client:
Genr8 in partnership
with Rochdale
Development Agency
and Rochdale Council
Architect: tp Bennett
Main contractor:
Willmott Dixon
Structural engineer:
Curtins
Steelwork contractor:
Hambleton Steel
Steel tonnage: 1,800t
14 NSC
April 19
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/Education_buildings
/Braced_frames
/Leisure_buildings#Theatres_and_auditoria
/Retail_buildings#Shopping_centres
/Construction#Steel_erection
/Concept_design
/Single_storey_industrial_buildings#Design_.26_Build
/Braced_frames
/Car_parks