Remaining residents to outline long-term wishes (video)
A MASTER plan for a clearance area will be drawn up after years of uncertainty and demolition.
Regeneration body Renew has appointed designers to come up with proposals for the Slater Street and Maddock Street areas of Middleport.
Initially, they will spend a couple of months consulting with residents and neighbourhood groups before publishing their vision for the community.
The area will remain predominantly residential with new housing, the renovation of terrace homes, and conversion of the flour mill by the canal into accommodation.
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Improving street parking, introducing traffic calming measures and creating open community spaces are also high on the priority list.
Middleport was designated as a clearance area by housing regeneration agency Renew North Staffordshire in 2006.
Since then, most of the homes earmarked for demolition have been purchased and the occupants moved to other parts of the city.
But a handful of residents are refusing to leave.
Renew development manager Harmesh Jassal, pictured, said: "This will be a clear and detailed vision for the future of Middleport.
"People will have plenty of chances to view the plans and have their say on the designs.
"The overall scheme is about enhancing the area and bringing the Middleport community closer together.
"The designers will look at everything from housing to transport and transforming public spaces."
The Building Design Partnership has been chosen to come up with the master plan, which will also cover the development of the former Wood and Sons Stanley Pottery site in Newport Lane.
Meanwhile, Renew is planning to work with Staffordshire Police to tackle anti-social behaviour in the hundreds of derelict properties in the area.
Some demolition work started over the summer, but plans have been held up as the clearance area programme was the focus of a public inquiry, which finished on Friday, following complaints from residents who didn't want to leave their homes.
The inspector's recommendations are expected in February.
Joanne Tyzzer, head of programmes at Renew North Staffordshire, said: "There has been an awful lot of high level planning. We have been working on how to link with other areas in Burslem.
"Renew is an 18-year programme and we have sympathy with the residents living in the development areas and appreciate it is unpleasant, but it is very important we achieve long term sustainability for the whole area, not just Slater Street.
"Consultation will take place from this month and we are hoping to have a preferred option on the table by January, then we will seek funding.
"At the moment, we are accelerating the works on sites like Royal Doulton and Bournes Bank.
"It will be a couple of years before activity starts in the Slater Street area, because we have to allow the market to grow with the properties being built on these other sites."
Although the exact details of the master plan are still in the infant stages, the proposals for the conversion of the 19th century flour mill beside the canal are more advanced.
It has stood vacant for more than two decades, but now Burslem-based developers Chris Shaw Properties has unveiled a proposal for 14 flats aimed at young people and small families.
East View resident Jean Alonso-Alvarez, aged 58, is one of the residents who opposed the clearance of Slater Street.
She said: "I think they should have come up with a plan a lot earlier than this.
"They will build one-bedroom homes which cost £120,000, but nobody wants those kind of homes. We want the terraces they are knocking down."
Comments
by Futurilla, Cliffe Vale
Monday, November 10 2008, 2:17AM
“So what the residents were saying all along was true. There _was_ no real masterplan for what would happen in thet area (despite at least £100k spent on consultants over the years), and it _was_ likely that the properties would remain empty for years because the funding would run out. The only consolation that ex-residents can have now, is that they sold their homes at a reasonable price at the top of the market. But on the other hand, so many were forced into debt in order to then buy a new property.”