A £10m vision to transform a historic Mersey waterfront are one step closer to becoming reality.
A bid has been put in to the Crown Estate along with a business plan by the Rock Ferry Waterfront Trust to help transform the pier and waterfront in Rock Ferry and to create a maritime hub in the area.
The plan includes creating a new boatyard and marina, a place for boat repairs, as well as a new sports centre. New moorings will provide access to the river at any time of the day for around 100 boats as well as improving a public slipway entering the river.
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The plans aim to “create a go to leisure destination to build on the tremendous maritime, commercial and residential heritage of Rock Ferry" according to the Trust.
Rock Ferry’s maritime history dates as far back as 1709 when a ferry service was set up and by the beginning of the 20th century, it carried more than a million passengers a year. It was also the first place flying boats landed on the Mersey before Speke Airport (now Liverpool John Lennon) was built.
According to the Trust’s website, “In the days of sailing ships the waterfront at Rock Ferry was known as The Sloyne, a recognised mooring for ships sailing into the Mersey well before the Liverpool and Birkenhead docks were built” and was the home for HMS Conway, the first merchant navy training ship of its kind in the UK.
Royal connections to the area also go back to Queen Victoria who was patron of the Royal Mersey Yacht Club when it opened in 1844.
The current bid is asking for £300,000 to survey the area and help develop the plans though current estimates for the overall plans are around £10m.
The bid and business plan have been submitted to the Crown Estate which belongs to the monarch King Charles III. This is after King Charles pledged in January to commit £1bn of wind farm profits from the estate to "wider public good."
Cliff Renshaw, Chairman of the Trust, said the plans would create a new maritime business and complement ongoing regeneration projects in Birkenhead and help revive the area around the Refreshment Rooms, a restaurant that reopened in 2012 after years of neglect.
There are also plans to open a new car park, picnic area, as well as 21 waterfront apartments at the Bath Cottages site in the area.
Mr Renshaw said: “It would benefit people not just locally but the whole of the North West. The only other place where you can get 24 hour access to the water is in Holyhead (in Anglesey) or Portpatrick in Scotland.”
He said plans had been in development for 10 years and the waterfront trust was set up in 2019 to buy the site off the Crown Estate who owned the site after the previous owners folded. He’s worried that if left as it is, the slipway and pier will continue to decline and two former oiler tankers could leak into the Mersey.
He is optimistic about the plans being successful, adding: “I am hopeful because what is the alternative? To let it continue to decline? The slipway is Grade 2 listed. Eventually it will fall apart.”
The feasibility study will look at whether the pier, which has existed for more than 100 years, can be repaired. If not, it will be demolished.
Mr Renshaw added: “It would be a shame to lose the peer but it could be dangerous to shipping” pointing to the collapse of a crane that meant shipping channels to Eastham had to be changed.
Information on the plans can be found here.
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