Construction of new housing development and school set to begin

A new housing development in Didsbury will be named after the village’s first recorded building – St James Park.A state-of-the-art primary school and 93 homes are due to be built at the former Manchester Metropolitan University site on Wilmslow Road.Developer PJ Livesey was given the green light to start work on the scheme by council planners in July and construction work is due to start in February.Bosses at Beaver Road Primary School will also build a new school for 420 pupils at the former MMU halls of residence opposite the housing scheme.PJ Livesey will convert the administration building and Grade II-listed chapel into a mix of houses and luxury apartments including three, four and five-bedroom family homes in the grounds.In total there will be three conversion houses and 10 apartments in the Grade II-listed chapel, 31 apartments and houses in the main administration block and eight new-build apartments and 41 new-build houses.Preparatory work has started on site but construction work and the conversion of the listed buildings will not begin until next month.The £26 million project looks set to create 350 construction jobs across the 17-acre site.The developer has announced that the housing scheme will be called St James Park to reflect the area’s first recorded building – a small chapel built in 1236 which later became St James Church.Beaver Road bosses said work to the second school site has not yet started. The empty Broomhurst site will be knocked down in place of a new primary school due to open in September 2017.The 85-year-old primary school currently has 700 pupils on roll and will be expanded to five forms of entry to eventually accommodate 420 children.