Heart of the City: Sheffield City Council halts sale of two flagship plots in £470m regeneration scheme

Sheffield City Council has halted the sale of two flagship development plots in the city centre due to a lack of proposals.

The authority has taken two sites next to Pounds Park on Wellington Street off the market after trying to sell them for almost two years.

It says it will now wait until a delayed food hall, hotel and office block are open before trying again.

The sites were launched in August 2022 as ‘two exciting new development plots within its transformational £470m Heart of the City masterplan’.

One is between Pounds Park and Wellington Street, where a builder’s compound is now.

The other is a former car park on the other side of the park, fronting on to Carver Street.

The council hired estate agents CBRE to market them, but there were rules. 

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Buyers had to show how their developments would ‘add to the dynamism of the area’ and provide ‘active ground floor frontages’ that would ‘connect into and enhance the Pound’s Park experience’. They also had to contribute to the council’s low carbon agenda.

This week the authority said CBRE’s marketing exercise had produced ‘no acceptable proposals’ and they were no longer for sale.

A spokesperson said: “We have taken the decision to wait until the anchor developments within Heart of the City are all open for business, before taking these two sites forward.”

They remain very attractive propositions for the private sector. We continue to review options of preferred uses, to ensure we get the right mix in this area of the city centre and will provide an update in due course.”

The delayed anchor developments within Heart of the City II include the Cambridge Street Collective food hall, which was due to open in September 2022, and Leah’s Yard workshops, Elshaw House office block and Bethel Chapel music venue were due to open in spring 2023. Officials blamed Brexit and Covid.

All except Bethel Chapel are now due to open this year, with the hotel stating it will open in June.