Legal agreement for Cowley Hill spine road unlocks region's largest consented housing site

Article date: April 8th 2025

The Cowley Hill Works site in St Helens was once one of the town's largest glass works, but now preparation can begin to unlock the whole site following the completion of a legal agreement between the site's promoters, BXB Land Solutions and Promenade Estates, the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority and St Helens Borough Council.

A new road funded by BXB Land Solutions will run from north to south through the site, from Washway Lane to College Street, and includes junction improvements at each end that will support new active travel routes to serve the development and the nearby town centre.

Investment for the active travel element of the scheme is being drawn from the City Region Sustainable Transport Settlement (CRSTS), a pot of £710m set aside for major transport infrastructure projects across the Liverpool City Region. "We're delighted to have arrived at this point and couldn't have got here without a genuine partnership with both the Combined Authority and St Helens Council," said Gary Goodman, land and planning director at BXB.

"We can now bring forward the site in its entirety, unlocking a range of new homes and employment opportunities for local people whilst improving connectivity with the town centre to the south."

The first phase of the site, for 200 homes, was sold to affordable homes provider Torus early last year. The grant allows the remainder of the site to be brought forward with confidence, says Mr Goodman.

Site investigation work will begin next month as a precursor to full construction, with the main contractor expected to be appointed later this Spring.

Commenting on the news: Lisa Harris, Executive Director of Place Services at St Helens Borough Council said:

"This marks the beginning of a partnership project that will not only provide much-needed high quality new homes to the Cowley Hill area on brownfield land, overcoming significant and complex viability challenges, but also bring valuable employment opportunities to the area.

"The new spine road will significantly improve connectivity to St Helens town centre - which is undergoing exciting transformation as part of our regeneration plans - for all aspects of transport, whether you drive, cycle, walk or wheel, benefiting both the local community, visitors and local economy alike. We're proud to be part of this exciting development, which represents our ongoing commitment to sustainable growth and improving infrastructure across the borough."

Steve Foulkes, Chair of the Transport Committee at the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority said:

"The Combined Authority are committed to encouraging and supporting active travel as part of Mayor Rotheram's mission to build the world class transport system the Liverpool City Region deserves.

"The £10m being committed to this new scheme comes on top of the more than £100m in total funding to upgrade walking and cycling routes across our region.

"The aim is to link communities, joining up new and existing developments - like the one at Cowley Hill Works - and provide access to areas and opportunities that were previously out of reach.

"It is a key part of our plans to build a London-style public transport network that is faster, cheaper, cleaner, better connected and, crucially, gives people a quality and efficient alternative to driving their car.

"The more people we can encourage people to walk or cycle, particularly for short journeys, the faster we can hit our net zero targets, reduce congestion on our roads and improve the quality of air we breathe."

The site is one of the largest brownfield land allocations in the St Helens Local Plan and its remediation fits with Promenade Estates' 'brownfield first' strategy, says its managing director, Dan Hynd.

"With the right technical approach and a genuine partnership with the public sector we can unlock more former industrial sites to help meet the nation's housing needs. Alongside BXB and our advisors, our technical expertise can address constrained sites and bring life and spending power back into our towns and cities."

The masterplan for the site was devised by architects Brock Carmichael, with CPC appointed as project managers and Nexus advising on planning. Gardner & Theobold are the scheme's cost consultants, with Curtins the structural and civil engineers. DB Remediation is undertaking the physical remediation works.

The western part of Cowley Hill Works has been retained by glassmaker Pilkington and remains in operation.