East Midlands Mayor 'really keen' to be involved in Broad Marsh as big announcement due

The East Midlands Mayor says she is "really keen" for her authority to be a partner in the Broad Marsh development ahead of an imminent announcement on how the rest of the project will be delivered. Nottingham City Council's chief executive said earlier in the year that conversations were being had with organisations including the East Midlands Combined County Authority.

The authority has been allocated millions of pounds every year by government to take decisions on local issues previously made in Westminster and to invest in local projects. One project repeatedly raised during the election for the first East Midlands Mayor, who leads the authority, was the Broad Marsh.

Half of the former Broadmarsh Shopping Centre has already been demolished to make way for the Green Heart, a plant-rich habitat which now sits in the shadow of the remaining Broadmarsh frame. The vision for that remaining half is for a mixed-use site to be created, comprising of 1,000 new homes and 20,000 square metres of office, commercial and leisure space.

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The development is expected to create around 2,500 jobs, but it has been the subject of three failed bids to the previous Conservative government's Levelling Up Fund. Ever since the last rejection, there has been uncertainty about when and if the rest of the Broad Marsh project will be delivered.

Yet Councillor Neghat Khan, Nottingham City Council's leader, recently said there will be a "big announcement" soon providing clarity on how the project will be delivered. The council leader indicated that a mixture of private and public sector funding will be used to support the rest of the project.

Speaking about how her authority could be involved, East Midlands Mayor Claire Ward said: "Obviously the city council are making progress on Broad Marsh and the leader has already indicated that they're working hard on that. We've seen the opening of the Green Heart, which is a really good step forward for Broad Marsh and I think that shows that there's real ambition to transform that part of the city.

"Myself and the combined authority collectively are really keen to be partners in that and to support wherever we can, but obviously there are lots of other things going on and stages to go through at this point. We are in discussions with them

"Obviously Councillor Neghat Khan said fairly recently there's more announcements in due course to come, so they're working really hard on all of that. Ultimately, it's land that's owned by the city council, but we can look at lots of areas where we can partner to support it." An announcement was previously expected by the end of 2024, but Councillor Khan said it might instead come before the end of the financial year in March.