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Work hasn’t been progressing on Liverpool Football Club’s new stadium. Stanley Park is going to be the new ground for Liverpool after the end of the 2011/12 season. It will be officially opened in August 2012 and will seat 60,000 fans with the option to have another 11,000 seats if required. The new Kop alone will hold 12,500 which is 5,000 more than the original Kop at Anfield.

Although ground work has been completed on site, nothing further seems to have happened which could be due to the current economic climate. It has been rumoured that the American owners of Liverpool FC have not yet managed to raise enough cash for the stadium to be built.

The London 2012 Olympics are only 3 years away and construction started on the Olympic village and all of the facilities even before the Olympics in Beijing had finished but are we on track to meet the targets for its completion?

Beijing set a high standard last year after producing some spectacular buildings to house to games, including the ‘cube’ for the swimming and the ‘Bird’s Nest’ for all the track and field events. We are all hoping that London is going to be even more amazing but will it all be finished in time?

The Olympic committee have already claimed that the London 2012 games will be the ‘greenest’ games ever. The Olympic village is located in Lower Lea Valley in East London. The project is twice the size of Heathrow’s Terminal Five and it is hoped it will be delivered in half of the time.

So far the buildings that are underway are the Aquatics Centre, Olympic Village and VeloPark. Construction will continue to accelerate over the next year or so when they will start to construct the last of the ‘big five’ venues which will include the International Broadcast Centre which will stream the games live across the world.

Sweden has sustainability incorporated into all of their new developments. Take the Vastra Hamnen development in Malmo for example. The docklands of the city were derelict and run down after the demise of the ship building industry in the 1970s. However, the city council took it upon themselves to redevelop the entire site, creating a new residential area as well as a number of mixed use developments, public open space and green infrastructure.

It has transformed an otherwise dilapidated part of Malmo as well as incorporating the ‘green’ credentials into all the developments. The majority of the electricity used on site will be obtained from renewable resources; waste water is recycled and reused onsite.

Would it be that difficult for Britain to include some of these ideas into new developments? Home owners already have certain rights set out in the General Permitted Development Order which states they can do certain things to their homes to make them greener such as installing solar panels or laying down extra insulation. But will it ever be possible to Britain to become totally ‘green’? Only time will tell.

Chester station is to receive £1.4 million to help funding the improvements. The money which was given by the North West Development Agency will help to provide new passenger facilities including a new waiting room, a second stairway to the platforms and extra office space. The station in Chester is steeped in history with the original building being Grade II listed. It is hoped that the improvements to the area will help to service the busiest platform at the station which see trains going to Manchester, Liverpool and London.

There is currently a large amount of regeneration work being carried out in and around Chester station, a project which has been named ‘Chester Station Gateway Project’. The Project is a key project within the Chester Renaissance Programme, which is seeking to bring together the public and private sector to deliver a package of regeneration priorities.

Chester Renaissance is delivering a programme of new development and city centre improvements that will make Chester a must see European city. The city council is hoping that it will attract more visitors to the city as well as encourage businesses and attract investment over the next 50 years.

Plans for a £400 million port in Salford have been given the all clear by council’s planning officials.

The project is to be constructed by Peel Group and the director of the project Mike Butterworth is said to be thrilled that the plans have finally been approved. Peel Holdings (part of the Peel Group) have been advised by planning consultants Indigo Planning who have offices around the country.

Following the go ahead from Salford Council, Peel will now be working with the Council, Highways Authority and other stakeholders to agree the strategy for implementing the scheme. It is hoped that the port will create 3,000 new jobs and boost the local economy by £83 million per year.

Mike Butterworth commented that Port Salford will bring together rail, road and short sea shipping together in a unique development alongside Manchester Ship Canal’. As well as this it is hoped that the port will reduce the number of lorry journeys through the use of the Manchester Ship Canal.

Salford councillor Derek Antrobus said the news of another major development in the area shows what a good place Salford is to invest and do business. He further stated that it was important to bring the Manchester Ship Canal back into use and should contribute to ‘improving regional transport and releasing capacity at Manchester’s Piccadilly Station’.

He says by bringing back the Manchester Ship Canal as a working waterway, Salford’s history is being used to secure the best possible future for the city.

The site which is located between Barton Bridge and Irlam in Eccles is approximately 137 hectares in size and will have the capacity to handle 300,000 container units as well as service 16 freight trains daily.
Bill Davidson from the planning consultants, Indigo Planning who helped to gain this momentous approval said that ‘Port Salford is set to boost the Greater Manchester economy by up to £83 million a year, creating a single location from which to distribute goods by rail or sea to a range of destinations and leading to a substantial net transfer of HGV kilometres from the road network’.

Westwood Station will transform an aging and underperforming industrial park into a vibrant, pedestrian-friendly mixed-use development featuring new office, retail, residential and open space while providing significant fiscal and community benefits to Westwood. Conveniently located adjacent to the Westwood MBTA/Amtrak station and in close proximity to Route 128 and Interstate 95, Westwood Station will be the region’s premier example of Smart Growth, transit-oriented development and a national model for mixed-use communities.

The project is a joint venture between: Cabot, Cabot & Forbes, one of Boston’s oldest and most respected real estate development firms; Commonfund Realty, Inc., the real estate arm of The Commonfund, the nation’s largest manager of college and university endowment funds; and New England Development, the region’s leading retail developer with more than 20 million square feet of retail and commercial space to its credit.

The location and direct MBTA access will have special appeal for Westwood Station residents commuting to downtown Boston and will encourage reduced vehicle usage, a key benefit of transit-oriented developments. Boston’s Back Bay and Financial District are just 15 minutes away by commuter rail, and the Amtrak trains provide express access to Providence, New York and Washington D.C.

Project Details
The 135-acre development has been master planned by the Boston architectural firm of Elkus Manfredi Architects to include 1.5 million square feet of office, lab and R&D space; 1.35 million square feet of retail space devoted to specialty retailers and restaurants; 1,000 residential units; and up to two hotels with a total of 330 rooms.

The project’s residential, commercial and retail components will create a “live, work, play” destination featuring a pedestrian-scale environment reminiscent of a traditional town center. Westwood Station will also exemplify sustainable design, incorporating various development principles to create an environmentally responsible project and bring benefits such as a comprehensive on-site water conservation/recharge program and a state-of-the-art, alternative fuel-powered internal shuttle bus system.

Cabot, Cabot & Forbes is working in close partnership with Westwood Town Officials, residents and Mass Highway to create a comprehensive traffic plan that will improve the existing infrastructure and create new infrastructure to minimize the potential impact.

History and Location
Westwood Station will replace most of the 250-acre, 3-million-square-foot University Avenue Industrial Park that was originally developed by Cabot, Cabot & Forbes in the 1960s. Cabot, Cabot & Forbes and Commonfund Realty have acquired 135 contiguous acres of land in the park, extending from Blue Hill Drive abutting the MBTA/Amtrak commuter rail station and extending the entire length of University Avenue to the Canton Street/Norwood town line. Many of the existing buildings on-site have outlived their natural life for industrial use and are unsuitable for renovation. The current vacancy rate is more than 30 percent and growing as tenants relocate to newer, modern facilities in other communities.

Vision
Working with the Westwood community, Cabot, Cabot & Forbes is committed to creating a nationally recognized model for mixed-use, smart-growth development and bringing the best possible use to this unique site. By taking a thoughtful approach to create a shared vision with the community, Westwood Station will provide a number of significant economic benefits to Westwood including a substantial increase in annual net tax revenue and added diversity to the town’s tax base.

Westwood Station will also be a strong economic engine for the region with the potential to create 7,500 jobs. The office, lab and R&D space is intended to create up to 4,500 jobs for high paying white collar, technical and life science professionals. The retail, hotel and restaurant portions of the project will create approximately 3,000 new jobs.

Click on the below images to see some of the proposed plans!

Rendering - Promenade

Rendering - Streetscape

Aerial View North

Proposed Master Plan

Rendering - Retail Streetscape

Rendering - Office