Rochdale council bids for £40m Levelling Up funds - and it could mean big things for Heywood and Middleton

Rochdale council is to make two separate bids for £20m in ‘levelling up’ monies for projects in Rochdale and Heywood and Middleton respectively. The applications will be made to the government by midday on Wednesday after bosses signed off on the proposals at the latest cabinet meeting.

The government’s much-vaunted ‘levelling up’ agenda aims to narrow regional inequalities and bring prosperity to ‘left behind’ areas in the north and midlands. Council bosses say successful bids would support the delivery of some of the authority’s ‘key regeneration priorities’ - including in Heywood and Middleton town centres and the area around Rochdale railway station.

Councillor John Blundell, cabinet member for economy and regeneration said the council was ‘excited’ to be submitting the bids, which would advance a ‘major milestone’ in the Rochdale rail corridor strategy and help to ‘showcase’ what the towns of Heywood and Middleton have to offer.

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The council-owned Central Retail Park site presents a ‘major opportunity’ to support the ongoing regeneration of Rochdale town centre, according to official papers.

Bosses want to deliver a ‘high quality’ residential-led scheme that would accelerate its plans to transform the area around the railway station and ‘maintain the momentum’ of town centre regeneration.

The authority had previously been working with developer Capital and Centric on a 200-home development dubbed ‘Neighbourhood Rochdale’ - but the Manchester-based firm has now stepped away from the project.

Now the council, together with Rochdale Development Agency and contractor Wilmott Dixon, wants to