Gloucester is “outshining everyone in the South West” with its £200m regeneration

Gloucester is “outshining everyone in the South West” with its £200m city centre regeneration.

Work on The Forum, the city’s new £107m business hub, is well underway and civic chiefs say it will play a vital role in attracting new investment and transforming the city.

And the University of Gloucestershire’s redevelopment of the former Debenhams building, along with the city council’s revamp of Kings Square and King’s Walk Shopping Centre.

The Forum has been designed to create a high quality workspace for employers who need the right environment for their teams to thrive.

The Forum’s main campus of 135,000 sq ft of Grade A workspace delivered alongside a 130-room four-star hotel, rooftop restaurant and bar, state-of-the-art digital conference facilities, a 9,000 sq ft wellness centre and innovation space.

This sits at the heart of a wider £200m regeneration of Gloucester city centre which includes a revamped Kings Square, an improved retail offer and space to spend time and learn.

Council leader Richard Cook (C, Kingsway) said: “We’ve done a lot in the city centre. It’s not easy. Everything costs a lot of money. It’s challenging in these difficult times. In terms of capital investment we’ve done relatively well. I put a lot of that down to the MP,” he said.

“He has the ear of certain ministers and doesn’t hesitate knocking on their door when it’s something he thinks is worthwhile. We have done quite well out of capital funding and this has made a huge impact in Gloucester.

“I’m proud we’ve worked with partners Reef and been bold in some of our decisions. We now demonstrate to the people in Gloucester and others in Cheltenham that we are outshining everyone else in the South West at the moment.”

Esther Croft, development director at Reef, says the regeneration of Gloucester has generated a lot of interest across the UK with authorities from the South West and South East visiting the site.

“We’ve hosted quite a number of visits. They’ve come and walked around,” she said.

“It has raised our profile with the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities and we have had a number of whole day away days here and the Arts Council, in terms of Kings Square.”

Gloucester MP Richard Graham says the city has faced its challenges but believes the key to the its current success has been the willingness of all partners in working together.

“We haven’t had non-stop successes, we’ve had some setbacks, there will always be projects still to do and things we need to work on.

“Politically it has been much easier to get agreement on a direction and strategy for Gloucester than it has been for many small cities. We’ve had broadly easy agreement between MP, City Council, County Council and other public agencies like the NHS.

“We’ve also been fortunate and quite creative about how we’ve gone about getting Heritage Lottery Funding.”

The A-grade office building has sustainability at its core. The buildings use natural ventilation and features such as solar panels on the roof and sensor-controlled lighting.

Workspaces will promote wellbeing by maximising natural light with large windows that provide amazing views of the cathedral and surrounding city.

Digitally advanced workspace is also key, and The Forum will be ‘a ‘best in class’ connected complex. Work to construct phase two began on site in March 2022 and the project is expected to complete in 2024.

By Carmelo Garcia – Local Democracy Reporter

Gloucester News Centre – http://gloucesternewscentre.co.uk