Plans for the redevelopment of Prestwich centre include an indoor ‘Mackie Mayor’ style market hall and and village square. The £100m plan to redevelop the centre of the neighbourhood includes the demolition of the Longfield centre, replacing it with independent businesses; homes; outdoor areas; and a new community ‘hub’ focused on health.
Popular venue Mackie Mayor contains a range of independent businesses offering different styles of food and drink in a former market hall.
A recent public consultation conducted by Bury Council’s development partners Muse said that the project should take inspiration from Chorlton, Altrincham, Didsbury and Manchester city centre’s Mackie Mayor to provide a leisure focussed type of market hall.
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It also contains plans for around 200 new homes. An update on the project to the council’s cabinet has been published this week.
It said: “The redevelopment of the Longfield shopping centre will replace outdated, inefficient buildings that are beyond their design life with modern, flexible, and energy-efficient commercial and community spaces that will create a vibrant and resilient village centre and diversify the evening economy. “The consolidation of public sector occupiers such as the library, community spaces and potentially health facilities into a modern hub building will enhance community service provision in Prestwich.
“The community hub and in particular the new library and community space will provide spaces for local community groups and organisations to curate and utilise for events in line with the council’s new cultural strategy. “A market hall of circa 10,000 sq ft will provide a mix of spaces for independent food retailers and traditional retailers.
“The concept for the market hall is to combine a high-quality food hall with communal seating, spilling out into the village square, along with smaller retail units which will be suitable for independent operators.” Current public car parking in Prestwich is planned to be consolidated into a ‘mobility hub’ 350 spaces with the freed up land used for housing.
The report also described a potential new village square. It said: “There will be high-quality public realm, including a new village square that will be flexibly designed to include spill out spaces from surrounding retail and market buildings and accommodate a mix of different ‘pop-up’ uses, including markets, food festivals, art exhibitions and live performances.”
The council approves the latest report the next stage will be to formally determine the draft phase one development plan. Other public consultations on the project are also planned in due course.
