Failed park and ride sold for housing
A FORMER car park is to be sold to a housing developer.
The sale of the former Kew Park and Ride in Southport is set to be approved by Sefton Council at a meeting of the cabinet this week.
The developer Homes England, already owns the adjoining site on Crowland Street.
The car park on Foul Lane first opened in 2007, costing £5 million to develop. Intended to ease congestion and serve visitors from Lancashire, the project did not succeed.
It boasted 600 parking spaces, toilets, and baby changing facilities and cost just £1 per day. However, despite regular bus services running to and from the town centre, it never achieved anywhere close to the popularity hoped for and closed down in 2010.
A report by Sefton Council said: “Homes England acquired the land at Crowland Street in March 2022 and thereafter approached the Council seeking terms to acquire the Council’s interest in the land at Foul Lane, subject to the completion of intrusive site investigations and a valuation being completed.
“Acquiring the land at Foul Lane would allow Homes England to work up a larger housing development scheme to be brought forward for planning in 2023/24. The deal offered by Homes England is not conditional upon the award of planning consent.”
The site did re-open for another trial period in 2012 but this again proved unsuccessful and since then the land has sat empty. The sale will give Homes England ownership of over 63 acres.
The report continued: “The council has allowed access for Contractors to undertake site investigations on the land for the highway crossing. The Combined
Authority agreed to provide grant funding to the Council for predevelopment works on site, which have been completed.
“There are abnormal ground issues at the site due to the composition of underlying strata, which contains peat and has extremely poor stability/loadbearing capacity.
“The agreed disposal price is supported by an independent valuation, which takes into account the intrusive site investigations and subsequent enabling works”.