One building in Merseyside has the largest footprint of any building in the UK.
The Jaguar Land Rover plant in Halewood spans 347,399 square metres, giving it the biggest footprint in the UK if covered walkways aren't included. If they are, its position is taken by the company's factory in Solihull in the West Midlands, according to analysis by Alasdair Rae, a former urban studies professor and founder of spatial data company Automatic Knowledge.
Before Ford Motor Company built a factory on the Merseyside site in 1963, the land was home to several moats and medieval residential buildings. This included the gothic arch and fireplace of Old Hutt, a substantial, isolated moated house thought to have been built by the Irelands, Lords of Hale in the 14th century.
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The vast factory helped bring employment to the area as it served Ford's and, from 2008, Tata Motors' production of Jaguar and Land Rover cars. But its size hasn't shielded it from a global shortage of semi-conductors Jaguar Land Rover said caused major issues across the automotive industry in recent months.
After workers were awarded an "inflation-beating" basic pay increase of 12.3% in October, the ECHO revealed Jaguar Land Rover would be cutting the number of shifts available for workers at the Knowsley plant, while dozens of agency workers had their contracts terminated just days before Christmas.
Workers feared it would reduce their take-home pay due to a loss of shift premiums. At the time, a spokesperson for the company said: "We continue to actively manage the operational patterns of our manufacturing plants whilst the industry experiences global semi-conductor supply chain disruption.
"Demand for our vehicles remains strong and we expect our performance to continue improving in the second half of our financial year, as new agreements with semiconductor partners take effect."
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