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South side story

Just when we thought Manchester's redevelopment was starting to slow down, a new partnership forms to lead a massive regeneration programme in the area surrounding the city's Oxford Road corridor. Eamonn Boylan, deputy chief executive of Manchester City Council, gives All About Manchester the lowdown.

Why is the Manchester City South area important for Manchester?

It's an important area because it contains some institutions of huge significance for the city in the shape of the two universities, the hospitals, the Royal Northern College of Music and a whole range of cultural institutions, which currently educate, employ and care for a huge number of people. And because it has that concentration of important institutions it will also be, in our view, one of the most important drivers of the growth of the Manchester economy for decades to come.

Increasingly, we are going to rely on high knowledge-intensive, research-based activity to ensure that cities like Manchester can maintain their position and improve their economic standing in a world where globalisation is happening daily. So for all those reasons the Manchester City South Partnership area is of huge importance.

What are some of the problems with that area now - why does it need a revamp?

There are a number of issues for us down there. We have this huge economic powerhouse with the universities and the hospitals employing some 37,000 people. It's one of the most dynamic and busiest parts of the city. Yet the areas immediately surrounding it do not really benefit in the way that they should from having such a dynamic neighbour.

So one of the big issues for us is how to increase levels of local engagement, local employment, local involvement and local benefit. And that's not only about physical design and making sure the people can get into and through the area more easily - it's also about trying to make sure that we're dealing with issues like basic skills, to enable residents to compete for the jobs that are being created in that area.

The second big issue is the fact that the Oxford Road corridor is one of the most important and most heavily trafficked arteries coming in and out of the city. I'm told that it's actually the busiest bus corridor in Europe. It's hugely important as a place that people travel through, as well as a place that people travel to. So one of the aspirations of the Manchester City South Partnership is to invest some really significant sums of money in improving the public transport and managing the movement of vehicles through the corridor, to make it easier for people to travel to and through this area.

We are also concerned with the public realm down there. What we have at the moment is a part of the city centre that's disconnected from the city centre. The part of Oxford Road between St Peter's Square and the Mancunian Way is not great - there are some very, very important institutions there, but the street itself is not what it should be. So the key priority for the redevelopment masterplan has been to try and introduce more wide open green space, safer pedestrian access and cleaner routes through the area.

Could you give us an idea of how big this regeneration project is?

It ranks alongside New East Manchester as being one of the biggest physical projects in Manchester. Just think about the numbers that are being invested - over £500 million is being spent on a new hospital development; the University of Manchester is spending £650 million on new facilities and Manchester Metropolitan University will probably spend over a third of a billion pounds on its campus. And we'll be investing, subject to the success of the Transport Innovation Trust (TIF) bid, probably £200 million on improving the infrastructure in the area. So in terms of the investment going in it's massive.

It's also important in terms of the jobs that we believe will be created. There are already 37,000 people working in the area and our view is that that will grow by at least another 9,000 jobs by 2015 and potentially considerably more.

But the other thing that we need to take into account here is that whereas many regeneration projects focus entirely on their immediate locality, this one will also have a wider economic impact. It's an opportunity for us to invest in ensuring that the institutions on the corridor can reach far beyond their locality in terms of their impact on the economy in the city.

So we are working with the hospitals trust on the creation of new facilities for research; we're working with the University of Manchester to make sure that it achieves its ambition of becoming a globally significant institution that can attract research investment; and we're working with MMU to develop its potential as one of the biggest and most popular universities in the country. So it's hugely important not only as a physical regeneration project but also as an economic driver for the city as a whole.

There are obviously some big players in this area, spending a lot of money on various individual development projects. Why is there a need for the newly launched Manchester City South Partnership?

There are hugely ambitious plans being delivered on the Oxford Road corridor and what none of the institutions involved want to do is do their thing in isolation. Because they all recognise that we need to make sure that we're getting the absolute best value for us all out of the investment that we are individually and collectively making. So there's a need for an overarching masterplan; there's a need for us to manage programmes of activity effectively across the whole of the area, particularly when there's such a huge amount of ongoing development.

This partnership arose as a result of the recognition by the partners of the need to make sure there was a point at which all the masterplans of the individual institutions and the local authority could come together and be managed in a coherent way.

Are there any definite plans for the central spine - the site that was proposed for the BBC move North?

We've worked in partnership with the owners of the site to create a masterplan for the central spine which will see it develop as a mixed-use area with a focus on commercial developments. So there will be office buildings, but it will also support a range of uses - a hotel, restaurants, new public squares and possibly residential units.

Are there any plans for the current BBC site on Oxford Road?

There are no specific plans at the moment but what we will be seeking to do is promote a masterplanning exercise to ensure that the opportunity that is created, if and when the BBC do vacate the site, is seized.

The local media picked up on the Bus Rapid Transit scheme in your proposals. Are you really looking to ban traffic from a section of Oxford Road to make room for 'eco buses'?

We are not looking to ban traffic from Oxford Road. What we are looking to do is find a means of making it possible for those who live and work within the corridor to gain better benefit from it, but also for those who move through the corridor to be able to do so more easily. So the intention behind the Bus Rapid Transit model is to reduce the number of buses and the volume of car traffic going through there.

How are you hoping to reduce traffic?

What we want to try and do is manage the traffic better so that some of it can be redirected to reduce volumes. If we're successful in building the rapid transit system then that will take a considerable volume of passengers, helping to further reduce the density of movement in the corridor.

It may not host the BBC as Manchester had hoped, but the Central Spine will shape up into a vibrant new city quarter, comprising commercial and leisure developments

How do you envision the area to shape up in the future?

We think we have the building blocks of something really rather special down there. We have the outstanding institutions, which are now creating new campuses for themselves in some of the most leading-edge new buildings and facilities anywhere in the UK. And we are supporting those institutions but also enabling them to be much more part of their broader community to help create a diverse and exciting new quarter for the city - a place that will be hugely significant for Manchester's economic future.

The Manchester City South Partnership includes Manchester City Council, the University of Manchester, Manchester Metropolitan University, the Central Manchester and Manchester Children's University Hospitals NHS Trust, and the North West Regional Development Agency. For more information on the partnership's development plans visit www.manchestercitysouth.com