Plans have been submitted by McLaren Living for a residential-led regeneration of the Broad Street Mall. It’s now over five years since previous owner Moorgarth submitted similar plans, and 7 months since I wrote up the planning exhibition ahead of this new submission. That more recent design has been revised somewhat, but to avoid confusion with multiple comparisons to different plans, let’s just take a look at these final proposals (also available on their consultation website and display boards upstairs in the mall).

The easiest way to get your bearings is the diagram below, which shows how the southern portion of the existing mall will be demolished. This includes the smaller units along Queens Walk from Sushi Mania to Pepe Sale (both hopefully relocated), the derelict section along Dusseldorf way including the former Eva/Mango nightclub, and a chunk of TK Maxx. The fashion retailer will upsize to the middle floor of the former House of Fraser in the Oracle in 2025, just ahead of the planned demolition here.

The plan entails 644 build-to-rent apartments, comprised of 298 one bedroom flats, 297 two-beds, and 49 three bedroom homes – the latter boosted in this latest revision responding to council policy to encourage family accommodation. Eight ground floor retail units replace roughly what’s lost in the demolition, and mall access from Dusseldorf Way is retained, as is 24-hour access to the downsized car park. Affordable housing, at 7.5%, will be mixed in rather than in a separate building as Moorgarth had previously proposed. Photovoltaics and air-source heat pumps lead the environmental credentials, with minimum EPC B rating promised.

The towers have been increased slightly in height as plans have progressed, to a maximum of 97.5 metres at the western end. This will be the highest point of the wider “Minster Quarter” regeneration: the same developer has recently signed up with the council to build further apartments (including 30% affordable units) on the vacant former civic centre site, illustrated in grey in the foreground on the CGI below.

The Tetris-piece car park frontage will be lost to the wrecking ball, but following feedback at the exhibition last year, multiple efforts are being made to honour its legacy. The shapes will be incorporated into paving at places around the re-landscaped perimeter, as well as in art installations. A section of wall screening the replaced car park ramps, which was intended as a green wall, is now proposed as a new interpretation of the same pattern work.

The raised pedestrian walkways around the Hexagon corner will remain and be refreshed. The below-ground warren of service roads come into their own during the build, with a temporary ramp proposed up to the back of the mall for construction traffic. Once operational, bulky deliveries to the apartments will be booked into subterranean loading bays and via basement access to the towers. Although strangely, it seems to be proposed for regular courier deliveries to pitch up on Hosier Street and deposit to the ground floor reception desks. Why not send those via the basement too? I fear a near-continuous stream of Amazon vans clogging up the supposedly revitalised market areas if this isn’t addressed.

My main feedback is around the car parking. Although let me first say, particularly for the benefit of those new to these pages, I am definitely a supporter of developments like this for two main reasons. Firstly, it provides the housing that is needed (mandated even) without endless suburban sprawl. Secondly, it adds people into the heart of the town centre, where their demand for goods and services, retail and leisure, helps underpin the viability of a broader offering that can be enjoyed by the wider community of residents and visitors. I think a bit of height, especially with the added safety of dual stair cores now planned in each building, is worth accepting to achieve those aims – and with good design can even be an asset in its own right.

However, potentially the experience for town centre visitors is impacted by the plans for car parking here…

The current mall car park has 784 spaces. As a result of the development this will drop to 494, a reduction of 290. But 100 spaces will be allocated specifically to residents of scheme. This leaves a revised capacity of 394 spaces for shoppers and visitors. Statistics of car park usage are provided, based on a surveyed week in November. I’ve added the dotted line to illustrate that this revised capacity would actually be hit six days per week, and for many hours per day. So whilst it is true that the mall doesn’t reach its parking capacity (in normal times at least), its needs would not be met most days by the new arrangement. I think if retail and customer convenience were truly at the heart of the mall owner’s priorities this would be looked at more closely, perhaps by insisting on retaining most of those 100 spaces given to residents (except those needed for disabled residents and potentially a car club), or by adding a floor the the remaining car park to compensate. Instead they argue that other car parks can ride to the rescue.

They provide plenty of evidence that this might be correct. But they are mostly dependent on Chatham Place multi-storey car park, which is only lightly used. I suspect the reason for that, given the pricing is the same, is convenience. So we will be asking shoppers and visitors to go further out of their way, literally, to bring their custom. And for some of those, the lure of their sofa, internet shopping, netflix and Deliveroo will win out. Some will argue let them cycle in or stay at home – a few shops shutting down is no disaster. But people really care about their town centres – the most commented on articles from The Reading Chronicle on Facebook this year are about a bar closing, and about the future direction for the town centre – 400 comments. So I feel it’s legitimate to ask how we can maximise the shopper and visitor experience, whilst being mindful of environmental issues.

Chatham Place was the glossy, CGI-blitzed regeneration project of the early 2000s. But its plan for a decked-over IDR with public square, buildings on top of the dual carriageway, including a hotel and swimming pool, never came to fruition. We’re still left with the noisy and dirty Oxford Road bridge, exposed to the elements as the traffic thunders below. At one of these planning exhibitions, a loose-tongued consultant blamed the council for not having a suitable “value capture mechanism” from the various developments in the area that could have funded the decking of the IDR. “That’s what they’d have done in London”. I’m reluctant to criticise the council – not going bust is probably a high enough standard to hold any council to right now. And we are getting the Hexagon extension to further add to the potential of the Minster Quarter. But maybe there’s still an opportunity…

Could we yet proceed with a simpler alternative to the vast decked sections across the IDR? How about a narrow extension to both sides of the Oxford Road bridge, to provide lightweight single-storey retail along the length of the crossing. This would shield the sight and sound of the inner ring road below, and with the removal of a handful of street parking bays as well, that space could be given to planting, or a cycle lane. We could transform this desolate, uninspiring traipse into a welcoming, vibrant continuation of the town centre over to West Reading. Could we yet convince McLaren to contribute towards an intervention such as this? After all, it’s to the benefit of their own customers now being asked to park up at Chatham Place.

Subject to planning approval, the work at Broad St Mall could get underway later this year. But a complex build will mean it will be 2029 before residents move in.

This investment into the Broad St Mall is a welcome sign of confidence in Reading. The wider Minster Quarter is the next exciting regeneration zone, following on from all the activity still taking place at Station Hill. But could we push for even more, to fulfil the opportunity to better connect the town centre outwards to the west?

What do you think of the plans? Comments are always welcome and can be left without registration.

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