citynews
February 2019
Information for City of Wolverhampton residents
from new office quarter
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orking with partners, City of Wolverhampton Council is helping to bring £3.7 billion pounds of public and private investment into the city, improving transport links, building thousands of new homes, increasing job numbers and giving people the skills to secure and keep work.
Enviable transport connections Change is happening right now in the city centre, with a new state-of-the-art railway station set to provide an attractive gateway for visitors to the city. The new
railway station will be fully open in the summer of next year. Midland Metro Alliance is also currently working on a city centre extension of the tram from the current terminus at St Georges, to additional stops at the new railway station and on Pipers Row. These are the final stages in delivering the £150 million-pound Interchange project - a public transport hub benefiting of a city allowing people to hop seamlessly from bus to tram to train, and forming part of wider plans to bring more jobs and investment to the area.
New Commercial District Further development around the railway station will see work start this year on the new landmark i9 building at Railway Drive. The striking modern office development is the next step in building a thriving commercial district, bringing new high-quality office space to the heart of the city centre and generating thousands of jobs. The new Grade A office building will follow on from the success of i10, which was fully let within nine months of opening.
Wolverhampton’s i9 development at Railway Drive
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Thousands of new homes on the way The city is seeing unprecedented housing growth with thousands of new homes and better places to live set to appear over the coming years. The first families have already moved into new homes at Danesmore Pastures
Plans to convert former Royal Hospital building into new homes approved
WV Living leads the way
Housing boost from private sector
City of Wolverhampton Council’s own housing company, WV Living, is building the first of 1,000 new homes over 4 years. Families have already moved onto Danesmore Pastures, 266 homes are being built at The Marches in Wednesfield, 40 at Peascroft in Bilston and 34 at Sweet Briary in Ettingshall, with many more planned.
Dated buildings have been demolished in Heath Town making way for 300 new homes. It will see a mixture of council and WV Living homes. You can find out more about WV Living’s new homes at www.wvliving.co.uk
WV Living is not only helping to accelerate the pace of house building in the city but is also giving confidence to private developers, with new build projects and major residential developments on the increase. Galliford Try Partnerships are building 227 new homes at the former historic Armitage Shanks Tap Works factory site in Low Hill
The council is in discussions with private developers to bring over 1,000 new homes to other parts of the city including Canalside South near the city centre. Alongside new-build projects, the council has brought 1,600 privately-owned empty properties back into use in the last 8 years.
Action group reduces rough sleeping
Star rating scheme improves housing standards The City of Wolverhampton Council’s pioneering work with private landlords is benefitting local people The ‘Rent with Confidence’ scheme is helping local people make better housing choices and improve the standard of accommodation in the private rental sector. Stars are awarded to landlords who comply with the law and who rent out property above the minimum statutory standards, with financial incentives for five-star landlords. Over 1,740 properties and 738 landlords have been star-rated to date.
and the former Tower and Fort works site in Graiseley. Award-winning builder, Countryside, is building 420 new homes at Bilston Urban Village on top of 78 built by Kier. Homes England have had plans approved by the council to convert the former Royal Hospital building and associated land into 115 new homes.
Tenants are able to choose their property and landlord through the Rent with Confidence website. The properties will have been checked and approved by the council as meeting the relevant star rating standards. The scheme aims to work with tenants, landlords and agents collectively to raise housing standards as well as targetting rogue landlords that put their tenants at risk. Find out more at www.rentwithconfidence.org.uk
Like other big towns and cities, the City of Wolverhampton has experienced problems with rough sleeping. A multi-agency approach between the council, Wolverhampton Homes, Wolverhampton BID, service providers, charities and voluntary groups, has more than halved the number of rough sleepers since April 2018, from 33 to 12. Many have been supported into accommodation while more than 20 others at risk of rough sleeping have been supported to keep them off the streets. Work is continuing to address the needs of vulnerable people to help them find a long term and sustainable alternative to sleeping rough.
Small change for a big change People who wish to help rough sleepers are encouraged to donate money at one of the many Alternative Giving campaign collection points around the city. Donations go direct to the service providers and charities that help the homeless in Wolverhampton.
You can find out more at www.wolverhamptonchange.co.uk
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eBay inspires city retail revival Sixty-seven businesses have reached the £1 million online sales milestone
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City of Wolverhampton business Goodstart Jones, maker of custom backpacks, has signed up to the Retail Revival Programme. Pictured (L-R): Paris Walker-Barnes, Goodstart Jones Illustrator and Designer, Rob Hattrell, eBay UK Vice President, Councillor John Reynolds, City of Wolverhampton Council Cabinet Member for City Economy, Goodstart Jones owner, Paul Jones, and Anson Carridice-Davids, Goodstart Jones Lead Designer
Supporting people to get local jobs
partnership between online marketplace, eBay, and City of Wolverhampton, is helping the city’s small businesses and entrepreneurs gain the skills they need for online trading. Sixty-seven businesses have reached the £1 million online sales milestone after just three months of training and support from a specialist eBay team. The Retail Revival scheme has seen experts from eBay provide exclusive support to small retailers who want to start up or expand their online presence, seeking to grow the local economy and demonstrate that online and high street retail can survive and thrive together. The partnership between eBay and the City of Wolverhampton is running until September 2019.
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2019 will be another landmark year for the City of Wolverhampton, with the extension of the hugely successful i54 business park set to increase job opportunities in advanced manufacturing.
Wolves at Work helps 3,676 residents into jobs
More young people into work The Skills and Employment Commission, set up by the Leader of City of Wolverhampton Council, Councillor Roger Lawrence, is helping local people find jobs. In all employment sectors, the hugely successful Wolves at Work programme is ensuring local people get access to the jobs being created. Run by City of Wolverhampton Council and Department for Work and Pensions, it has helped 3,676 residents gain employment in 2 years – around 45% of whom are aged 18-29. You can find out more about the Wolves at Work programme and how it can help you at www.wolvesworkbox.com
The £300m, i54 Western Extension (South), which is in the ownership of City of Wolverhampton Council, will create around one million square feet of new business space and is set to deliver up to 1,700 jobs. Work is scheduled to begin this spring on a new access road, followed by land preparation works which will commence early 2020. The western extension scheme also includes a plan to boost i54 Western Extension (South) employment skills, training and recruitment for local people, with £150,000 funding set aside to help local people to access the newly generated jobs. Already the most successful enterprise zone in the UK, the current i54 site has a workforce of 2,700 people, with half of them living within a 10-mile radius. More than £1 billion has so far been invested in i54, with more than 4,000 jobs anticipated on the existing site when it has been fully built out over the next few years, adding to the multi-national companies - JLR, Moog, ISP, Eurofins, ERA and Tentec – already on site. So far, over 3,500 students have also benefitted from a Bird’s eye view of i54 Western Extension due to begin spring 2019 targeted skills and education programme.
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The new School of Architecture and the Built Environment at Springfield campus is set to create over 1,200 graduates.
Skills for the future - Artist’s impression of the new £100m School of Architecture and the Built Environment
A city leading in innovation and opportunity massive regeneration project happening right now in the City of Wolverhampton is the University of Wolverhampton’s new £100 million Springfield campus development – a major centre of research, learning and innovation.
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Built on the site of a former derelict brewery, Springfield will become a centre of excellence and Europe’s largest, specialist construction and built environment education super-campus. The facility will develop the skills for the workforce of the construction industry required in our growing city and the wider region. It will provide an unbeatable route into construction education and training for young school leavers from the age of 14, right up to senior professionals.
The campus’ flagship facility – the new School of Architecture and the Built Environment, is currently under construction and is set to create over 1,200 graduates. It will specialise in supporting skills in architecture, construction, civil engineering, building control, building services, facilities management, quantity surveying, planning, construction management, housing and the commercial sector. The new facility, due to open in 2020, will join the West Midlands University Technical College and the Elite Centre for Manufacturing Skills Hub already on the site. The University Technical College offers unrivalled opportunities for 14 to 18 year olds, specialising in training the designers, construction professionals and architects of the future. Springfield campus is just one example of the collaborative working and heavy investment that is propelling City of Wolverhampton to the forefront of investment destinations in the UK. Most recently the Mayor of the West Midlands – Andy Street – announced details of a National Brownfield Institute to be built on the Springfield campus. It will be dedicated to delivering more efficient ways of getting former industrial land across the region ready for development. Springfield will tap into the WMCA’s new £5m Regional Construction Training Fund – expected to train a minimum of 2,280 recruits over three years.The training programme will focus on the unemployed and low-waged to help boost the region’s productivity and underpin continued economic growth. Research by the Construction Industry Training Board (CITB) found that the West Midlands will have around 215,000 people employed in the sector by 2020 – an increase of more than 10,000 jobs since 2015 – and University of Wolverhampton’s Springfield Campus will be at the forefront of delivering these workers.
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www.wlv.ac.uk
OUR VISION “Our vision for Springfield is that it becomes a hub for excellence in construction and the built environment on a national and even international scale. “The National Brownfield Institute is a major part of these plans and we see it as being very much a beacon for skills, providing solutions through innovation and new technology for the sector as a whole. “There is a huge amount of brownfield land across the Black Country and the wider West Midlands and we are looking forward to helping play an integral role in identifying and unlocking that land’s potential for regeneration and in particular supporting ways to address the housing shortage. “Springfield itself is a perfect example of how brownfield land can be transformed and regenerated supporting jobs and the regional economy.” P R O F E S S O R G E O F F L AY E R V I C E C H A N C E L LO R O F T H E U N I V E R S I T Y O F W O LV E R H A M P T O N