DISTINCTIVE NEIGHBOURHOODS

LIVERPOOL CIty CEntRE

Liverpool city centre is the main economic driver for the City Region and a thriving place for business, leisure, living and learning. Over the last decade, the city centre has been transformed through major investment in developments such as Liverpool ONE, the multi-award winning shopping, leisure and residential complex, the growth of the Commercial District, the establishment of the Knowledge Quarter, the revival of the Waterfront, including the construction of the Arena and Convention Centre, and the success of the cultural and creative quarters of Hope Street, Ropewalks and the Baltic Triangle.

The city centre has a strong and growing cultural offer, including more listed buildings than any city in the country outside London, and investment in major attractions such as the Philharmonic Hall, Everyman Theatre, the Albert Dock (including the Tate Gallery), and World Museum, the Museum of Liverpool, the two cathedrals and Central Library. The city centre also hosts large-scale events including the UK’s International Festival for Business 2014, and a major annual festivals programme.

BALTIC TRIANGLE

The Baltic Triangle is an historic area of the city centre and comprises numerous 18th and 19th century warehouse buildings which are now enjoying a renaissance as Liverpool’s creative quarter, a cutting edge destination where pioneering creatives work.

The area is home to musicians, photographers, artists, fashion designers, digital agencies, architects, film-makers, recording studios, eateries, nightlife venues, and

internationally acclaimed arts festivals and galleries. It is a hub for new and growing creative and digital businesses, clustered in commercial centres such as Baltic Creative, Elevator Studios and The Women’s Organisation and home to alternative venues such as Camp and Furnace and Baltic Bakehouse. It is also establishing itself as a centre for learning, with the recent opening of The Studio School and Life Sciences University Technical College.

The Baltic Triangle is rapidly emerging as a vibrant and industrious city centre district containing within its boundaries a range of large and small business and residential investment and development opportunities. The Brewery Village scheme typifies the type of larger opportunity available; a mixed use residential led development with outline planning permission and a value of £150m, it will deliver one million square feet of residential, retail and leisure floorspace.

COMMERCIAL DISTRICT

Liverpool’s Commercial District lies within the City Enterprise Zone and has witnessed a significant expansion. Since 2000, more than 1 square feet of grade A office space has been successfully delivered. Schemes such as 100 Old Hall Street, City Square, 20 Chapel Street and St Paul’s Square together with investment in the public realm have transformed the look and performance of the area and helped to attract new companies to the city.

The area is effectively managed by the Commercial District Business Improvement District which is responsible for delivering improvements to make the area more desirable, business friendly, cleaner, greener, safer and more vibrant.

The Commercial District is expanding to make the most of major opportunities for investment to deliver new commercial floorspace, with the principal focus for investment to deliver new grade A floorspace focused on Pall Mall, expanding the Commercial District eastwards and Princes Dock the first phase of Peel’s Liverpool Waters development to the west.

HOPE STREET

Hope Street is a high quality visitor, culture and leisure quarter, with a unique historic character. Surrounding the luxury Georgian townhouses of Canning, Hope Street is home to some of the most important cultural attractions in the city including the Philharmonic Hall (and the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra), the Everyman and

Unity theatres, and the Liverpool Cathedral and Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral. It is also host to a wide variety of independent hotels, restaurants, quality bars and cafés as well as being a significant national and international visitor attraction in its own right benefiting from its location adjacent to the city’s four universities.

The quality and importance of the street was recognised by the Academy of Urbanism, as the UK’s best street in the Great Street Awards 2013, which celebrates the best examples of urban places throughout Europe.

The historic character of Hope Street presents unique and exciting opportunities to invest in the distinctiveness of the area. There are several important historic buildings ripe for refurbishment and reuse, and gap sites for new infill developments, which will further enhance Hope Street as a world class visitor and cultural destination. The emphasis is on quality and capitalising on the area’s unique cultural and leisure offer.

KNOWLEDGE QUARTER

The Liverpool Knowledge Quarter is home to an unrivalled concentration of knowledge economy assets within an urban centre setting. These assets include the University of Liverpool, Liverpool John Moores University, The Royal Liverpool & Broadgreen University Hospitals NHS Trust, the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, Liverpool Science Park, MerseyBio, the National Oceanographic Centre, the City of Liverpool College, and on its periphery the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts, Liverpool Women’s Hospital, and Liverpool Hope University.

Together these assets make a major contribution to the economy of the city and the region, and the area continues to attract further investment. Major investment in knowledge-based developments, such as the £424m redevelopment of the Royal Liverpool Hospital, the redevelopment programmes of the universities and the expansion of Liverpool Science Park and the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine have established the Knowledge Quarter as an attractive and compelling destination for knowledge-based businesses.

In recognition of the importance of the area to the city’s economy, the Mayor has designated it a Mayoral Development Zone, one of five such zones within the city. The area benefits from a Mayoral Development Zone

Board which includes the most senior representatives of its universities and hospital and has been created to promote, coordinate and oversee the attraction of investment to the area. The universities and hospital are delivering their own multimillion pound investments in the area alongside the delivery of new laboratory space within the Liverpool Science Park and University of Liverpool’s BioInnovation Hub. For the future, the redevelopment of the hospital opens up sites which will be developed to create a BioCampus focused particularly at biomedical incubation and commercial laboratory space.

MAIN RETAIL AREA

The completion of several major retail developments in recent years has transformed Liverpool city centre, and created a diverse retail offer, with many new brands coming to the city. This investment means that Liverpool is now ranked in the top five shopping destinations in the UK and in the top 25 in Europe.

The RIBA award winning Liverpool ONE retail project completed in 2008 by Grosvenor Developments has created 1.4 million square feet of retail space, a 14-screen multiplex cinema and 230,000 square feet of restaurants, cafes and bars in addition to 600 new apartments, two hotels, offices, a five-acre park and a transport interchange. Liverpool ONE melds seamlessly into the Church Street and Lord Street heart of the main retail area.

The £75m Met Quarter retail development opened in 2006 converted from the shell of the former Post Office building. Close to Liverpool ONE and the tourist magnet of Mathew Street the Met Quarter provides two floors of aspirational designer brands. Bold Street is a destination shopping street for independent shopping, with many alternative shops, cafes and restaurants along a traditional high street. St John’s Shopping Centre and Clayton Square complement the retail offer with more brands and complementary shopping experiences.

The City Central Business Improvement District represents retailers in the main retail area, and aims to maintain the city centre as a retail destination of choice and promote Liverpool as a premier European city.

Investment is needed to make qualitative improvements to the retail offer, rather than increasing the quantum, by redeveloping and refurbishing existing floorspace to replace outdated retail properties.

HISTORIC DOWNTOWN

Historic Downtown is located within the old central business district of the city centre, and lies within the City Enterprise Zone and in the designated Liverpool Maritime Mercantile City World Heritage Site. The area is full of large grand Victorian and Edwardian buildings, several of which are underused and in need of investment. Historic Downtown presents exciting opportunities to create new neighbourhoods in the city centre, around some of the city’s most famous historic locations.

One of those neighbourhoods is the Cavern Quarter, centrally located between the main retail area and commercial district. The Cavern Quarter is the focus of The Beatles history. It encircles the world famous Mathew Street and is one of the city centre’s key tourist destinations.

Adjoining Mathew Street, the Stanley Street Quarter has emerged as the ‘gay quarter’ of the city. The area is full of life with a vibrant night time economy of bars, pubs and clubs which cater for the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community. This is overlaid by local businesses of small retail outlets, offices and some residential properties catering to the wider community.

Historic Downtown is undergoing a period of significant change, with large, historic former commercial office buildings being converted into new leisure, retail and residential uses, particularly along Dale and Victoria Streets. The area is gaining a new lease of life and purpose for the future, with conversion of some of the magnificent properties into boutique hotels being particularly successful. There are opportunities to invest in some of the city’s most important, historic buildings and sites with potential for redevelopment in an area at the heart of the city centre.

ROPEWALKS

Ropewalks lies on the eastern edge of the city centre directly behind the Liverpool ONE retail district. The area is characterised by a traditional 19th century street pattern originally comprising maritime warehouses and merchant houses. The long narrow streets remain much the same as they were 200 years ago.

Sitting partly within the World Heritage Site, Ropewalks is now a dynamic, mixed use neighbourhood, with a high concentration of apartments, creative and digital businesses and cultural attractions such as FACT (Foundation for Art and Creative Technology), Parr Street Studios and the Black E. Chinatown lies on the edge of Ropewalks, home to the oldest Chinese community in Europe whilst Bold Street is a bustling shopping street, full of independent shops, restaurants and cafes.

Ropewalks is an exciting place to invest, with many distinctive historic buildings in need of new life and new uses, and several gap sites for infill development. Clusters of development opportunities are located around Wolstenholme Square, along Duke, Seel and Berry Streets, and around Chinatown.

WATERFRONT

Liverpool’s city centre waterfront has transformed dramatically over the past five years, with major schemes including the development of the Arena and Convention Centre Liverpool, the Museum of Liverpool, the mixed use residential and commercial development at Mann Island, and new hotels including Jury’s Inn and Staybridge.

At the Albert Dock, an extensive programme of environmental and infrastructure improvements has been implemented including new lighting, signposting and pedestrian access.

At the Pier Head, the new City of Liverpool Cruise Liner Terminal attracts visits from some of the largest liners on the European circuit, and the Leeds - Liverpool Canal Link provides unbroken access for narrow boats to newly constructed berths in the south docks. The new Mersey Ferries Terminal includes a cafe, restaurant, 4D cinema and Beatles Story exhibition.

The Museum of Liverpool opened in 2011 in a purpose-built landmark building on Liverpool’s waterfront, and is the largest newly-built national museum in the UK for over a hundred years.

The waterfront’s Mann Island has been awarded ‘Regeneration Development of the Year’ for bringing an area back into sustainable economic use. The stunning black granite buildings make a striking architectural statement set around a South and West facing central public realm and Plaza. The area overlooks a tiered canal basin with locks, linking the Pier Head with the Albert Dock complex.

As well as being a major tourist destination, the waterfront is an important commercial centre, with office floorspace at the Three Graces, Mann Island and the Albert Dock. Much of the waterfront lies within the City Enterprise Zone and opportunities exist for investors and developers and for businesses to locate at this location amongst world famous buildings and spectacular views.

The largest and most significant development currently on site on the waterfront is the £63m Exhibition centre and hotel, being developed by the City Council, expanding the successful ACC at Kings Dock. Adjacent is a 3.2ha site available for a leisure led investment of £30m to £50m.

OUtSIDE tHE CIty CEntRE

LIVERPOOL WATERS

The Liverpool Waters vision involves regenerating a 60 hectare historic dockland site to create a world-class, high-quality, mixed use waterfront quarter in central Liverpool. The scheme will create a unique sense of place, taking advantage of the site’s cultural heritage and integrating it with exciting and sustainable new developments. Liverpool Waters will contribute substantially to the growth and development of the city, allowing ease of movement and strong connections between north Liverpool and the city centre. It will provide 9,000 new homes, create in excess of 15,000 new jobs, attract national and international businesses, and encourage a significant increase in the number of visitors to the city.

Liverpool Waters is part of the Mersey Waters Enterprise Zone and the 30 year vision makes it one of the most important waterside regeneration and investment opportunities in Europe. The project has outline planning permission and is based on the delivery of 5 new distinctive neighbourhoods including offices, visitor attractions, retail and leisure, education and community uses as well as significant residential development.

STONEBRIDGE

Stonebridge is located on the north-eastern boundary of Liverpool, at the junction of the M57/A580 East Lancashire Road and provides significant development opportunities either side of a major gateway into the City. It is one of the five Mayoral Development Zones.

Stonebridge Cross Mayoral Development Zone represents a major strategic opportunity for the city to create new business space and jobs in the north east of Liverpool. It has potential and plans for investment in warehousing and distribution, retail and mixed use development and has benefited from significant investment in its infrastructure.

NORTH LIVERPOOL

North Liverpool includes the largest of the Mayor of Liverpool’s five Mayoral Development Zones. Some of its most significant economic development opportunities and potential lie within the city fringe and port hinterland area immediately adjacent to the city centre and extending northwards seven kilometres to the Port of Liverpool which has been designated an Enterprise Zone and the North Liverpool Mayoral Development Zone.

The location offers significant potential for growth and has some of the city’s best physical and cultural assets, along with the proximity to the city centre, the port and Peel’s landmark Liverpool Waters development to its west. Major projects already underway include the Anfield Project a £200m area regeneration project incorporating the expansion of Liverpool Football Club’s iconic stadium.

Opportunities exist to provide new commercial floorspace on underutilised sites with the potential to attract businesses servicing the city centre, the port and the Irish Sea off shore wind industry in particular. Around Stanley Dock and the Leeds-Liverpool canal investment is focusing on the cultural and visitor offer with the largest current investment opportunity being on the Stanley Dock tobacco warehouse and south warehouse.

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EDGE LANE

The Edge Lane Corridor is the heart of the Central Liverpool Mayoral Development Zone, and includes a range of commercial sites which together form a key strategic link between the end of the M62 motorway and Liverpool city centre. The corridor includes several significant land parcels with investment and development potential.

The Mayoral Development Zone has a strong retail and high-tech base with many firms in the IT sector based at the well-established Wavertree Technology Park. Key projects include the rebuilding of the Edge Lane Retail Park a £200 million scheme delivering 600,000 square feet of new retail, leisure and restaurant space; the redevelopment of the former Littlewoods building on Edge Lane for offices, business space and a hotel; and the development of a food hub including wholesale Fruit and Vegetable Market. Other significant investment and development opportunities are available at Liverpool Innovation Park. The area is served by the main Manchester to Liverpool train line and includes two rail stations: Edge Hill and Wavertree Technology Park.

Significant investment in road links and the environmental quality of the corridor in recent years have provided the basis for a quality gateway worthy of a European City.

SOUTH LIVERPOOL

South Liverpool’s Mayoral Development Zone (MDZ) is one of the city’s most important gateways and includes the arrival point for international visitors and trade via Liverpool John Lennon Airport and the Port of Garston. The area is an established employment zone of regional significance with a recognised cluster of internationally competitive and regionally distinctive businesses ranging from small and medium sized enterprises to international companies.

Specific employment sectors, such as automotive and bio-pharmaceuticals continue to grow here in terms of both the number of jobs and the contribution to the value of the local economy. The area’s confluence of road, rail, sea and air corridors offers further scope for the logistics and distribution sector. Liverpool John Lennon Airport has an important role in this regard and the area’s relationship to the airport and its natural and cultural assets provides opportunities to grow the visitor economy. In the medium - longer term a greater number of sectors in the area will see growth in employment, spanning both the manufacturing and service industries, with uplift predicted in construction, land, transport, hotels and catering, professional services, other business services and the health and social work sector.

South Liverpool MDZ is the focal point for major economic and residential development in the south of the city, offering the quality of environment and infrastructure that enables the businesses and communities of Speke, Garston and Hunts Cross to achieve their full potential.

The area contains opportunities for investors, developers and occupiers with some of the larger opportunities located at Triumph Business Park, Estuary Commerce Park and Liverpool International Business Park.

For further information about investment opportunities in the city, email invest@liverpoolvision.co.uk

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Images used in this document include photographs produced by McCoy Wynne Professional Photography.