Vauxhall's factory at Ellesmere Port is to be one of four plants in Europe that will build the new Astra.
In October 2007 Ellesmere Port and Neston Borough Council joined up with Vale Royal Borough Council and Chester City Council, to submit a bid to the Government to establish a new growth point for West Cheshire. On 16 July 2008 the Housing Minister announced that the bid had been successful.
The Council and its partners are now working on preparing detailed bidding documents to draw down funding from central government to enable the growth to take place across Cheshire West and Chester.
The Government wishes to see a major new housebuilding programme nationally in order to provide an extra three million new homes by 2016. Consequently it invited expressions of interest from those authorities which feel that they can accommodate much more housebuilding on brownfield sites and can link it to new employment growth in a sustainable way.
Ellesmere Port has seen a shift in new housing towards brownfield sites in the older parts of the town and the Borough Council is confident that there is signficant potential for more. The council believes that this would help to revitalise the older parts of town and would help to provide more affordable housing. The bid demonstrates the links between Chester and Ellesmere Port and the towns in Vale Royal. One of the largest potential sites in the West Cheshire area is the redevelopment of Ellesmere Port docks, which the owners Peel Holdings wish to develop for 7000 new homes over the next 15 years.
The bid assumed at least 500 new housing units per year can be built in Ellesmere Port.
To read the bid submitted for West Cheshire, click the link below:
For further information on the growth point bid please contact Mike Worden
