The redevelopment of the city’s wholesale market site in Hickman Avenue is designed to accommodate the City of Wolverhampton Council’s fleet services operation, which will relocate from its current Culwell Street depot.
The move will free up the Culwell Street site for hundreds of new homes as part of the Brewers Yard regeneration masterplan.
Relocation of the fleet services and redevelopment of the wholesale market will look to create a further 110 construction jobs, help reduce the council’s carbon footprint and support its programme to deliver a fleet of electric vehicles.
The modernisation plans have been developed in consultation with market traders and other existing users.
Enabling works to begin this spring will include the demolition of ancillary buildings on the Hickman Avenue site.
Main construction works are expected to get under way by early autumn this year.
It will be business as usual for the wholesale market throughout all stages of the work.
Once it is built traders will move out of the old wholesale market building into the new one.
City of Wolverhampton Council Cabinet Member for Environment and Climate Change, Councillor Craig Collingswood, said: “It will be terrific to see the start of preliminary works at the Hickman Avenue site as it will be a signal that we are moving closer to the regeneration of 2 important city sites.
“These projects are going to be a huge boost to the city in terms of jobs, businesses and homes.
“The proposed relocation of our fleet services operation will make it more efficient further cutting the council’s carbon footprint, while the redevelopment of the Hickman Avenue site will see buildings that are more than 50 years old replaced at the city’s wholesale market.”
An outline planning application has already been approved for the Culwell Street depot site to demolish the existing buildings, remediate the brownfield land and make it ready for the development of new homes as part of the Brewers Yard scheme in the coming years.
Once all the land is unlocked for housing the completed scheme will see a mixture of houses and apartments, and new retail and commercial space.
The development will also sit just a few hundred metres from the city’s new transport Interchange, providing quick, direct access to Birmingham, London and Manchester.
