By Carmelo Garcia – Local Democracy Reporter
A stalled major Gloucester city centre redevelopment will be extremely difficult to pull off without the £6.3m which was originally allocated to it.
Concerns were raised earlier this year over the future of the stalled Fleece Hotel revamp after it was revealed funding for it had been redirected to another project.
The Fleece, a 15th-century timber-framed Westgate Street building, was in the process of being restored by Gloucester City Council last year.
However, initial revamp plans for the site stalled and no detailed designs were forthcoming from the council’s preferred development partner Dowdeswell Group.
In February 2023, council chiefs said they were in talks with other firms which may have been interested in redeveloping it.
But they revealed in January that the initial £6.3m of Government funding for The Fleece was reallocated to the University of Gloucestershire City Centre Campus and the Forge which is part of The Forum project.
Another “bold vision” to turn the site and the nearby Longsmith Street Car Park into a community and business hub was announced in February this year but there has been little to no progress on it to date.
The Phoenix Village Project aims to regenerate the historic Fleece Hotel on Westgate Street, which has been empty since 2002, to “offer supported accommodation with skills training and assistance with health and mental health issues to help them reach their full potential”.
It is proposed that the village complex would have spaces set aside for wellbeing and socialising, along with independent businesses set up to give them on site experience.
But now council leader Jeremy Hilton (LD, Kingsholm and Wotton), who raised concerns as leader of the opposition about the transfer of funding allocated to the scheme earlier this year, says there has not been much progress on the scheme.
“There’s a number of projects that we’ve taken over from the previous Conservative administration where the focus was stalled, minimal or troublesome,” he said.
“And we need to resolve those and get them sorted and the Fleece Hotel site is extremely difficult.
“The Conservatives were allocated £6.3 million pounds for it and then they redistributed that with the former MP’s agreement, into the Forum and into the university campus.
“So the money that was there for the Fleece is not there any more. And it’s a complicated site.
“It’s got different parts to it. You’ve got the old historic Inn. This is a really difficult one.
“You’ve got the former Gloucestershire Academy Music site on Mercers Entry.
“I’ve been inside, it’s not in good condition but you can see the quality of the original building. And then of course, there’s a long Smith Street car park.
“It might be that proposals are too big for what to do with one big project. We don’t know, but we’re, we’re meeting Phoenix Village fairly soon to discuss with them their project to see what they’ve got in mind.
“The money is not there for that project, it’s got a negative equity because it’s historic, it’s really expensive to restore and then it’s market value after that. So we’re having conversations with the Phoenix Village just to look at where they are on that one.”