Music venue plan faces axe due to funding shortfall

Plans for a 2,200-capacity live entertainment venue as part of a major regeneration of Huddersfield are set to be axed.

A report to be considered by Kirklees Council has set out how more than £67m originally earmarked for the venue was "no longer available" and that the remaining budget of £23m was insufficient.

Instead, it suggested that officers "revisit" and present alternative options for the site.

The proposed venue was intended to be one of the main attractions of the project dubbed Our Cultural Heart - a major plan to transform the town centre into a new cultural and leisure district.

Under the proposed changes, the report said £3m would be set aside to develop the final phase of the programme through "options appraisals and feasibility studies".

The change would reduce the council's planned borrowing by just over £20m, according to the report.

Detailed budget proposals will be drawn up over the coming months, with the final budget to be agreed next March, the Local Democracy Reporting Service said.

The venue element of the wider scheme was placed under review early last year.

Opposition groups had urged the then-Labour administration to scrap the plan but the council said there was still demand for a venue.

The wider development scheme has a budget of more than £200m.

At a meeting of the council's Growth and Regeneration Panel on Monday, questions were also raised about the future of the Queen Street plot – another aspect of the Our Cultural Heart scheme.

That site was once earmarked for a new STEM block for Greenhead College, but funding could not be secured.

The council is now considering alternative uses, including a hotel, offices, a car park or housing.

The meeting was told how the scheme had already delivered a new library hub and public square, with the only remaining element of the first phase being the food hall on the site of the former Queensgate Market.

Although not open yet, the building has undergone a major transformation and is now at the stage where the council is seeking food businesses ahead of a planned launch next year.

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