A multi screen cinema, a 20,000 sq ft foodstore, and food and drinks outlets are being promised by the owners of Manchester Fort as the owner of the 325,000 sq ft retail park in Cheetham Hill looks to diversify.
Plans submitted by Investment manager Nuveen to Manchester City Council include the redevelopment of the B&Q and Halfords units which the owners say represent the retail parks initial focus on bulky goods.
Instead they plan to secure the strategic long term future of the development, “a vulnerable retail market” has created “a number of threats”, and in order to “enhance its resilience to an increasingly challenging market, more needs to be done to ensure the longevity of the park”.
The plans are being put before Manchester Council’s executive committee at a meeting tomorrow in a draft vision outlined by the architects Turley which also includes making more of the site’s gateway location on a key radial route into the City centre and creating a more inviting and usable pedestrian environment.
Over 20,000 people live within a 20-minute walk,and 830,000 live within a 15-minute drive of the retail park which falls within the remit of the Northern Gateway.
The Northern Gateway is being progressed via a partnership between the City Council and the Far East Consortium and is envisaged to deliver 15,000 new homes and supporting
infrastructure over a 10-15 year period.The effect of this alters the context in which the Shopping Park lies and will lie in the future – being close to new and expanded residential communities, and to areas of strategic investment over the long term.
“This raises the importance of the Shopping Park as a community asset, one which is accessible to and aligned with the needs of residents and creates an opportunity for the Shopping Park to respond to potentially significant greater local demand.
The UK retail market is in a fragile state,says the report,characterised by low consumer confidence,increased personal mobility, high shopvacancy rates, weak retailer demand for space and general market uncertainty caused by both the migration of shopping to on-line platforms and Brexit. Recent economic conditions have had an impact on expenditure growth and the changing ways in which goods are purchased has had a significant impact on the retail sector as a whole.
The plans invisage ‘Linked trips’ becoming more commonplace, with visitors undertaking their destination shopping trip, potentially picking up a daily food shop from the
supermarket offer (M&S Food plus a potential addition), and then experiencing the leisure offers on the Park.
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