Manchester shows again how devolution can unlock complex sites

Does anybody reading this use Salford Central Station to get into the city? I do. What an embarrassment, right?

I suppose it’s great that I haven’t had to lift any pensioners into the train carriages since the platforms were rebuilt to eliminate the huge step up. But what a waste the vast empty atrium is, and those vacant arches opposite, and why are the automatic doors on the front locked up and blocked with an empty Metro Newspaper tray?

Well, all that could soon change thanks to devolution!

A deal between Transport for Greater Manchester and Network Rail has been signed to deliver a ‘joint vision’ for Manchester and Salford’s central train stations over the next 12 months. Naturally, the headline benefit is around delivery of Andy Burnham’s ‘Bee Network’, extending tap-on tap-off to local commuter railways; but there are also lines in there around regeneration and development opportunities and increasing commercial income from land in and around stations.

One of the shared key goals says that the two organisations will take a joined-up approach to securing additional funding and maximising commercial development opportunities around the stations and assets.

You might ask why this wasn’t being done anyway. The thing is, Network Rail has a huge estate across the country and arguably needs a nudge to do a deeper dive in to a particular area. It’s the devolved governance of Greater Manchester which can provide this nudge in a way that a patchwork of local authorities never could.

Whilst my grumbles above about Salford Central are valid and likely shared by the thousands of people who use the station daily, this deal is designed to do more than move the newspaper tray and put somewhere to buy a coffee in the atrium.

Railway stations in the city centre are surrounded by hugely desirable development sites that a lack of joined up thinking has held back from reaching their full potential. There has, of course, been notable progress at Victoria North and Piccadilly East. But what about the vacant arches on Whitworth Street West by Oxford Road, or all of the empty space by Salford Crescent? By 2031 Greater Manchester is projected to add another 130,000 people and it would terrible planning to not accommodate a proportion of this in the urban core next to key sustainable transport nodes.

It seems obvious, doesn’t it? That’s because it is, but it wouldn’t have happened without the political clout of a Metro Mayor in a devolved combined authority to unlock it.

If places like Blackburn, Chester, Preston and Warrington are looking on with envy and wondering what untapped opportunities may exist at their railway stations, then there is only one way to find out.

Sean Fielding is the former Labour Leader of Oldham Council and currently serves as a Labour Councillor in Bolton. He is an Associate Director at political and communications consultants Cavendish. For a conversation about devolution in the North of England and how it impacts you, he can be contacted at sean.fielding@cavendishconsulting.com.