A brand new road junction on one of the main thoroughfares into Liverpool is mysteriously blocked off by concrete slabs.
The "road to nowhere" in the Croxteth area consists of a new purpose-built, traffic light-controlled junction with the East Lancs Road (A580). But all access either to or from the junction is impossible thanks to the stone slabs laid across the entrance.
Enquiries by the ECHO revealed this was intended as an access road to a 55-acre site called Stonebridge Cross, which has been earmarked for more than 1,000 homes.
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In March 2021, Liverpool Council agreed on plans to move a development plan forward for Stonebridge Cross in Croxteth, with a view to building 1,200 homes on the site.
Liverpool Council has held the site since acquiring it from Homes England in 2014 and has been facilitating the creation of over 300,000 square feet of business and commercial space there.
Stonebridge Cross was also one of two sites considered by Everton Football Club for its new stadium before settling on Bramley Moore Dock. It had been hoped back in 2020 that work on the site to deliver new homes could have started within 12 to 18 months.
An update from Mark Bourgeois, interim Strategic Director - City Development, detailed how the local authority was procuring consultants to progress the site towards an outline planning application. Mr Bourgeois' report, issued in September, said a workshop was held with the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority and Homes England in June to discuss a housing offer, employment uses and procurement of consultants.
No timescale for an outline planning application has been set at this stage, according to Mr Bourgeois' report. The development of the site is part of a wider regeneration of the Croxteth area in the last eight years, including the £18 million St John Bosco Arts College, the first phase of Stonebridge Business Park West and creation of 20 acre landscaped park, Alt Meadows.
A spokesperson for Liverpool Council confirmed the access road was put into the Stonebridge Cross site as part of "development infrastructure," adding: "The road will continue to be blocked off until such time as a development starts on site."
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