Shoppers and students in Nottingham think plans for 293-bed student flats 'will create life' in the city centre. It comes as Halfords Auto Centre and Archer Accident Group on Huntingdon Street have been demolished to make way for a new seven-storey building.
The student flats will be built on this site and on land at the back of the demolished dwellings after work started preparing the land months ago. Plans were granted permission by Nottingham City Council on January 4.
The new building will be four storeys behind a retained façade, five storeys along the Howard Street frontage and then rise to seven over the former Halfords unit on the Huntingdon Street and Perth Street frontages. And people in Nottingham say they are keen for the work to be finished.
READ MORE: City centre buildings to be demolished to make way for 293-bed student apartment complex
Kevin Lindley, 58, who lives in Underwood, said: "I think local businesses and city centres are dying from a shopper's perspective because everyone just uses Amazon or other online shopping websites. Therefore city centres need to find a new life for themselves and attracting students will create that life.
"Also, students going to nightclubs, bars, restaurants will reinvigorate cities. The days of cities being reinvigorated by putting shops there I think has come to an end. For example, if you walk out to the end of town where Broadmarsh is, all the shops around the former shopping centre are shut anyway."
Sophie Westwood, 22, a Nottingham Trent law student who lives in The Glasshouse on Union Road, said: "Sure they demolished and moved the businesses there, but more students would surely mean more profit for other local businesses around, right? Students keep the city alive, and it's not as if they're being shut down, they have been moved so I don’t see anyone losing here."
Connor Walsh, 19, a Nottingham Trent student who lives in The Glasshouse, said: "It's probably quite biased coming from me as a student but as more and more students come into the city, you need to house them. So I personally think its a great project."
Franklin Ellis Architect has designed the student flats on behalf of Bildurn (Properties) Ltd, who is building the flats.
A Halfords spokesperson said: "We can confirm that the Halfords Autocentre on Huntingdon Street in Nottingham closed on 25th February this year and the keys were handed back to the landlord on 11th March."
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