Client
Rochdale Council

Other Partners

Registered social landlord Riverside Housing Group and housing market renewal pathfinder Oldham Rochdale Partners in Action.

Project Summary

Langley is a 1950’s housing estate on the edge of Rochdale. It once had one of the highest levels of vacant housing stock in the UK, hence its inclusion in the housing market renewal programme. In 2002 Riverside took on much of the existing housing stock as part of a stock transfer arrangement. However Rochdale Council retains considerable land interests ranging from parks and schools to depots and shops. Working together the parties have already completed a range of environmental improvements and Langley now feels a lot different to how it felt in 2002. That said parts of the estate are still untouched, including the central retail parade which is both an eyesore and fails to meet local people’s shopping needs. Together the parties wanted to explore how the next wave of development and regeneration can be achieved. Central to this is redeveloping the existing local centre, and creating ‘oven-ready’ development sites for up to 500 new homes.

Eye Role

Eye helped the Council and its partners conclude a masterplan for the regeneration of Langley in 2008. We are now helping to put in place a delivery mechanism between the landowners as well as developing a procurement strategy for regeneration of the sites.

Something clever about Eye's approach

Both Rochdale Council and Riverside wanted to play a central role in the next phase of regeneration and share in the risks and rewards. However they recognised the need to provide clarity and certainty to developers and to work out lots of details about how they would work together before approaching the market. We therefore conceived the idea of a ‘land pooling agreement’ through which the partners would set out in detail their working arrangements and how they planned to procure new developers. This also includes agreement on how development returns will be shared which is critical so that development happens in the order that will achieve the best regeneration outcome and is not driven by financial needs.

Latest project news

November 2011 - Eye retained as critical friend as first housing and regeneration projects are taken forward

February 2011 - Riverside Housing Group has given its agreement to sign the land pooling agreement with Rochdale Council

October 2010 - Rochdale has given its agreement to sign an innovative land pooling agreement with local landowner Riverside Housing Group