Three further years of disruption in Manchester but at the end of the billion pound investment programme, fifty thousand more residents and forty thousand more jobs in Manchester.
That is the message that council and transport chiefs are sending out as they launched Manchester, a growing success story, a report by independent regeneration experts Ekosgen, which details how Manchester city centre is predicted to thrive over the next decade.
Anyone coming into the city will of cause see the effects of various projects, roads being dug up, trams being shut and footpaths closed.
There is more to come. The St Peter’s Square tram shop will be shut for two months next summer and the following summer and will be operating a single track non stopping route.
But the city has survived the disruption before says Sir Richard Leese, head of the City Council, just look how it got through the 1996 bomb, adding that there has been no indication that the work so far has led to any disruption of the cities businesses.
The coordinated investments, collectively known as grow have been ongoing for sometime. Metrolink’s Second City Crossing, The Northern Hub, Cross City Bus Corridor and the Redevelopment of Victoria Station.
Those coupled with major developments such as NOMA, First Street, Spinningfields and the regeneration of St Peter’s Square and the Civic Quarter will, according to Richard Leese, will strengthen Manchester’s position as a major European city.
The growth in jobs will come from various sectors. Manchester has the largest creative and digital cluster in Europe outside London, currently employing 162,000 people, in education where more than 100,000 people are currently employed and Within leisure sport and financial services.
Once the work is completed in 2018 an additional £4-5 billion pounds will come into the city on an annual basis.
For more information about Grow and details of the constituent projects, visit www.manchester.gov.uk/grow
A dedicated Twitter feed providing updates on Grow and where different works are up to is launched today, Tuesday 9 September, at @MCRGrow
