The old Saint Gobain site in Doxey Road is earmarked for redevelopment as part of the Stafford Station Gateway project, which will see new homes and employment space created on brownfield land next to the town’s railway station.
The Doxey Road land was acquired by Staffordshire County Council in 2018 as part of the creation of the Stafford Western Access Route. Remediation work needs to be carried out on the land before it can be redeveloped however – and more than £16m has been earmarked from the Government’s Levelling Up Fund towards this.
Staffordshire County Council cabinet members gave the go-ahead at their latest meeting to enter into a funding agreement with Stafford Borough Council to receive the money to do the work. Deputy leader Councillor Philip White said it was a “really significant investment in the county town and in regeneration and provision of housing and further employment land”.
He added: “This site was acquired by the county council, but it is land that wasn’t required for the completion of the (road) project. It is former industrial land and heavily contaminated; there were lots of rather unpleasant chemicals used on the site and in order for it to be redeveloped, it requires significant remediation to ensure it’s safe for future occupation.
“We have been working for a number of years to develop a proposition to receive funding for that work to go ahead. It’s not commercially viable for the private sector to do it, and we have been working in conjunction with our colleagues at Stafford Borough Council to secure funding for this work to be done.
“We placed an application into the previous government’s Levelling Up Fund programme and I’m very pleased to say that the proposal for this site received approval for the third and final iteration of this fund. Our part in this process is a supporting part – the accountable body for the funding that will pay for the work to remediate the site is Stafford Borough Council.”
Councillor Jeremy Pert asked: “When do you think realistically we will see some of the benefits from this investment in remediating the land? Without public investment to remediate the site, it will never come forward as anything else but industrial land.
“This site is adjacent to the county town and it is sustainable by train as it is right by the station. With some of the other investments that are going on in the county town and the county’s economy, it allows people to use the West Coast Main Line but equally underpins the town centre regeneration.
“With the investment in education in the Institute of Technology, we will see other embryonic businesses coming into the county and particularly the county town because of this. All of this is great news and I really welcome the investment – I can’t wait to see the benefits of the investment.”
Councillor White responded: “In terms of the work to get all of that underway, the first stage is a design stage. For the type of remediation work we’re talking about you can’t do guesswork, you have to do detailed work to plan how you make the site safe.
“That work should be completed by the end of November this year. Once that work is complete, we can finalise the evaluation and tenders to complete the work and that should be completed by this time next year, then work can get underway straight away after that.
“These things don’t happen in the blink of an eye. But we are working at pace to go through that detailed safety-driven work to get that site to where it needs to be so it can be developed.”
The Doxey Road land is split into three broad plots, a report to the cabinet said. The proposed end use for land to the north of Doxey Road is light commercial use of up to around 30,000 square feet.
The report said: “This site is currently tenanted by a motor vehicle repair workshop and a community transport operator. Alternative premises for both operations are being progressed.
“Residential end use is proposed for land to the south of Doxey Road, and the area of land between the Stafford Western Access Route and the West Coast Mainline (plots two and three). The typology of housing being proposed would be of a more contemporary/modern nature than traditional semi-detached/detached properties and is expected to be formed of modern terraced housing and apartments; Plot 2 will also contain local greenspace amenity areas.”
