the sale of the old sorting office at Temple Meads to Bristol University has been approved
Bristol City Council will finally sell the former Royal Mail sorting office at Temple Meads, after councillors agreed to replace it with a new campus for Bristol University.
The major scheme will form a key part of the regeneration of the 'Temple Quarter' project to revitalise the area behind and around Temple Meads station in Bristol.
The sorting office site, which has been a blight for passengers arriving and leaving Bristol at Temple Meads for years, will be knocked down to make way for the £300 million campus for 5,000 students.
But council chiefs who gave the go-ahead for the sale this evening said they would make sure the university plan would not stop a proposed 2,500 new homes on the rest of the Temple Quarter area from happening.
The council agreed to sell off its freehold interest and the remaining land on Arena Island that is not required for the new Arena – some 2.9 hectares in total. The Royal Mail left the sorting office site for its huge headquarters at Filton in 1997.
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Council chief Helen Holland admitted that when they drew up the strategic plan for Temple Quarter, they didn't envisage the university being the key player - an 'anchor' - in the regeneration, but she hoped the university moving in would spark the redevelopment of other areas.
"This is going to be a real catalyst for the sort of development at Temple Quarter we've been looking for," she said. "We weren't expecting to see the university take up the major part of this, but this is a good news story."
Council chiefs pledged to work with the Bristol Wood Recycling Project, which is based on a site near the old Cattle Market next to the sorting office, and is now under threat because it will have to move.
The council will net a total of between £11 million and £16 million from the land sale, and the new campus is expected to include a business school and student 'residential village'. But having hundreds, maybe thousands of students, on the Temple Quarter area would not mean the 2,500 proposed 'regular' homes for people who weren't students would not be built, Ms Holland said.
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For years the sorting office stood empty, until Bristol City Council, under former Mayor George Ferguson, bought the site for £6 million, using a £5.4 million grant from the Government.
New campus for Bristol University
The business rate income from the university is likely to be lower than from a "purely commercial deal" it added, but said it would give "more certainty" to the development of the other sites.
Bristol Mayor Marvin Rees said: "This is an important deal for consideration by cabinet that could see the development of a major new campus for the University of Bristol and the acceleration of development in the Bristol Temple Quarter Enterprise Zone.
"The derelict land close to the station has been a blight on the city for too long, and this deal could offer an exceptional opportunity to create a flourishing and inclusive home of digital excellence, innovation, education and industry.
"It could also bring forward more quickly jobs and opportunities for our citizens from other sites in the area."
Now all that is left is for the council demolish the sorting office, and for the University of Bristol to get planning permission for their new campus.
