Plans for an advanced manufacturing park on a Scunthorpe gateway site have been revealed, with the potential to create almost 2,000 jobs.
A huge land deal has been completed by North Lincolnshire Council as it looks to create space for high skilled and low carbon industries, taking advantage of the Humber’s freeport status. Towns Fund cash allocated by the government has been used to buy up 60-acres of farmland off the M181, paving the way for the creation of a four million sq ft development.
Cllr Rob Waltham, leader of North Lincolnshire Council, said: “This is a massively exciting project which will have profound effects on the area for generations. It will create hundreds of well-paid, high-skilled jobs in advanced sectors and will be a globally significant hub for research, development and innovation.
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“We are already leaders in advanced steel making and this development will create the right environment for more world-leading businesses to join the North Lincolnshire stable, creating and developing innovative, leading-edge products.
“With the fantastic motorway links and clear ties to the ports complex, access to national and international markets will be immediately available – helped of course further through the Government’s flagship freeports project which will help make these companies even more competitive.”
The scheme will be taken through planning, with formative discussions with developers and potential end users understood to be underway.
Classed as speculative, market analysis on available industrial space has fed into the decision, with tier one and tier two suppliers into the offshore wind industry a possible target.
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It has been described as a lite version of the park developed in South Yorkshire, with the likes of Mclaren, Rolls Royce and Boeing now calling the former Orgreave Colliery site between Rotherham and Sheffield home for manufacturing processes.
No value has been placed on the deal - though it is believed to be in the region of £2 million - with Avison Young acting for AD Foster & N Pask, Joint LPA Receivers. It is part of a wider estate that is proposed for the Lincolnshire Lakes mixed use development.
It is one of several schemes being developed under the Towns Fund programme, overseen by the Scunthorpe Towns Fund Board, and linked to the two projects paid for using the Future High Street Fund money as part of the levelling up agenda.
So far, some £35 million has been committed by the government for Scunthorpe through the Town Deal and Future High Streets Fund, plus £12 million for the Burringham Bypass connectivity improvements on the M181 / A1077, as well as £14 million for flood defence work on the River Trent and £35 million for the new pumping station at Keadby.
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