Business

McAleer & Rushe in green light for Tyneside student scheme

Image of the Newgate Street scheme which McAleer & Rushe will complete for Newcastle City Council
Image of the Newgate Street scheme which McAleer & Rushe will complete for Newcastle City Council Image of the Newgate Street scheme which McAleer & Rushe will complete for Newcastle City Council

COOKSTOWN construction giant McAleer & Rushe has been given the green light by Newcastle City Council for a £100 million mixed-use development scheme in the Newgate Street area of the city which will create 400 construction jobs.

The proposals include a 269-bedrooms hotel, student housing and 2,000 sq m of commercial space for retail, leisure or professional services use.

McAleer & Rushe also announced that the 575-bedrooms student housing element of the scheme will be operated by the UK’s leading provider of purpose built student accommodation Unite Students.

The creation of 575 new student rooms will deliver £2 million of net additional expenditure into the local economy. Unite already provides a home for over 46,000 students in 133 properties across 28 of the UK’s strongest university cities.

McAleer & Rushe’s has delivered more than 20,000 hotel bedrooms and is on target to deliver 7,500 student bedrooms within five years of entering the student accommodation sector.

The Tyrone developer and contractor’s previous schemes in the locality include a major hotel, office and residential scheme at St James’s Gate and the 204-bedroom Jurys Inn Newcastle-Gateshead Quays.

Plans for a previous scheme for the Newgate Street shopping centre site were enhanced following extensive consultation with stakeholders including Newcastle City Council and Historic England.

McAleer & Rushe project director Graham Mitchell said: “This scheme has evolved through extensive consultation with many stakeholders. This announcement is the culmination of a lot of hard work, engagement and collaboration to deliver the best possible scheme.

We hope to start on site in 2016 and to deliver the student element by summer 2018.But this is a very challenging site and there are still a number of complexities, particularly in terms of the prominent city centre location, that we have to resolve."

He added: “This £100m scheme signals McAleer & Rushe’s commitment to, and confidence in, the City of Newcastle and we look forward to bringing forward further schemes following the completion of discussions with a number of potential hotel partners."