Manchester City Council has welcomed the government's confirmation of more than £25m to fund home improvements in Collyhurst and West Gorton.
The vision for the next ten - fifteen years is to create a vibrant new place with mixed housing for working families and employment. The plan includes building more than 2,000 new private homes - in a wide range of housing types, from family homes to apartments - and refurbishing another 1,000, boosting the population by 10,000 residents.
Manchester was provisionally awarded £29.245m of Decent Homes funding over four years in February 2011 but only 2011/12 (£3.1m) and 2012/13 (£0.5m) were confirmed with the bulk of the funding (£5m in 2013/14 and £20.645m in 2014/15) ‘backloaded' in the later years.
Since then the council has improved 213 homes with an initial £4m of Decent Homes funding giving them a new lease-of-life with enhancements including the replacement of single-glazed windows and doors with new energy efficient double glazing, replacement kitchens and bathrooms, the installation of energy efficient boilers and better insulation.
Today's announcement means that the council will be able to move ahead with home improvements for Collyhurst residents beyond October 2012, when the current years Decent Homes funding was due to run out. It means contractors will be able to stay on site and continue with the programme of upgrading the stock. It also means that the Council can start to demolish recently emptied poor quality housing in the West Gorton are.
Councillor Jim Battle, deputy leader of Manchester City Council, said: "Securing this funding is great news for the area and we welcome the announcement and the Governments continued interest in what we're doing here.
"Securing this funding means that we can get on with the improvements which Collyhurst residents need and deserve. It also gives confidence to residents in West Gorton that we are able to continue the major improvements we have started there, by demolishing poor quality empty stock on the estate.
"We have made progress in the transformation of Collyhurst but the scale and complexity of the challenge requires a longer-term focus. We've said before that Collyhurst is a real priority for us and the council remains absolutely committed to its regeneration. We are going to need continued government support, and recognition of the huge potential of Collyhurst as a residential area, to fully deliver on that promise."
The council, working with Network Rail and the Homes and Communities Agency (HCA), launched a search earlier this year for a lead investment partner, to realise plans for a series of high quality new residential neighbourhoods in Collyhurst and the Lower Irk Valley.
