London Road Fire Station opened its doors yesterday, as the developers showed off some of their plans for its future. I headed down to get a glimpse inside, after all these years, and take some photos.
I’ll put exterior shots into the same folder, if I ever find any that I’ve taken. I was positive I had some, but haven’t found them yet.
Some, potentially, good news. London Road Fire Station has been sold to developerswho actually appear able to get things done with their properties.
The building has been sitting there, waiting for a new lease of life, since before I arrived in Manchester an unmentionable number of years ago. I’d really like to see something done with it.
I’d really like to see inside it before any work begins, as well. I wonder who I have to ask about that?
Grade II*-listed central Manchester landmark London Road Fire Station is to be sold to Spinningfields developer Allied London and be renamed Manchester Firehouse. Originally opened in 1906 as a fire, police and ambulance station as well as a coroner’s court, the building had lain empty under its previous owner since 1986 – although it did have planning permission to be redeveloped into a hotel.
Source: New owner for Manchester landmark London Road Fire Station
And the M.E.N. can reveal Capital & Centric, the firm behind Manchester’s planned new Kampus quarter, are considering a swoop for the controversial building
This time Manchester council bosses will be determined to ensure that whoever buys the listed property – which is on English Heritage’s at-risk register – will actually develop it
The plan seems to be to turn it into a hotel, but I’d love to see something more creative done with it, or some form of mixed use.
Source: London Road Fire Station to be sold – finally – Manchester Evening News
The petition is a call for the council to apply for another compulsory purchase order. This won’t save the building outright, but it would, if successful, wrest it out of the hands of Britannia Hotels, who have done sod all with it for 27 years.
The London Road Fire Station is one of Manchester’s great lost buildings, possibly the greatest. I say lost, but it’s still standing, more or less. The owners, Britannia Group, have done less than the bare minimum needed to keep it intact and it now looks like it’s in danger of falling down. Sign the petition to have the previously overturned Compulsory Purchase Order overturned and, hopefully, something done to rescue the building.
(The petition site asks for a donation, you can ignore it and still have your signature included. I accidentally did this twice.)
The London Road fire station was one of Manchester’s great buildings, and it’s still glorious to look at even in its current dilapidated state. It’s worthy of an architecture wander all by itself. Nothing has been done to develop it since the fire service moved out in 1986. When I was a student at UMIST, which is a very near neighbour, I heard there were plans to give the building to the University for student accommodation and/or a students union. Obviously that never happened.
Now the council are moving to get a compulsory purchase order, and the fire station’s current owner, Alex Langsam of Britannia Hotels has given an interview to Manchester Confidential in which he claims that, after 24 years of doing nothing, he’s finally, really, really this time, going to get around to doing something with the building. Unsurprisingly, I find his promises hard to believe.
