Plan submitted for Maritime Hub aimed at ‘rebirth of port industry’

PLANS for a £10m Maritime Hub seeking to invoke the ‘rebirth of industry’ in Whitby have been officially submitted.

Ambitions would see a multimillion pound, three-storey maritime centre at Endeavour Wharf, on Langborne Road, to provide space for businesses and employment opportunities.

The hub – funded through £17.1m under the government’s Towns Fund – aims to “drive the rebirth of the town’s maritime industry by providing new opportunities” including workshops, laboratories, and space for start-ups.

The majority of the site has been used as a public car park for the past 20 years and the north and east sides provide access to moored vessels for loading and unloading goods.

North Yorkshire Council said that if its plan was approved, the hub would place Whitby at the “forefront of the expanding offshore renewable industries in the North Sea and will also boost job opportunities for the local community”.

The council’s corporate director of community development, Nic Harne, said: “We have received some suggestions that following Eskdale School’s merger with Caedmon College this summer, the school site would be a better location.

“But existing and potential future tenants of the wharf have stated they need direct access to the water and as such the school site would not be a suitable alternative.”

The 0.9-hectare area on Langborne Road is opposite a supermarket building and Whitby Station. The proposed building would provide workshops on the ground floor to house the current wharf operations of the Harbour Authority, as well as provide space for marine biology and an expansion of “emerging industries” including offshore wind.

However, concerns have been raised by some groups about the level of engagement with calls for the project to be halted and reviewed. In a town poll held last autumn – which had a very low turnout of three per cent – a majority of respondents said that Whitby Town Council should petition to "halt and re-examine" the scheme.

Opponents Whitby Community Network argued over poor communication and "inadequate consultation”.

But the council outlined a process which included at least nine public events and exhibitions, more than 400 contributions, and 40 meetings. It added that “69 per cent of those who responded to the survey were supportive of the scheme”.

North Yorkshire Council’s executive member for open to business, Derek Bastiman, said he believed the hub would “open the door to new economic and tourism growth for Whitby and Scarborough”.