Plans to create a major golf, leisure and housing development in Hoylake took a step closer last week, as Wirral Council’s cabinet was set to agree the project moving to the next stage. Subject to agreement at a Council meeting on 18 December, the next steps allow for a full planning application to be submitted in 2019.
The “golf resort” will include a championship golf course, an 18-hole municipal course, a golf academy and practice range, a Celtic Manor-branded 90-bed hotel, which will have associated conference facilities and a spa.
The controversial £200m scheme will see approximately 40 apartments built next to the hotel and developer Story Homes plans to build 160 houses.
Celtic Manor, the company behind the South Wales luxury resort which hosted the 2010 Ryder Cup and 2014 NATO summit, will manage the entire attraction and Story Homes will lead on the housing development, both working alongside Jack Nicklaus Joint Venture Group.
The planning process will begin in February next year, with consent determined by June 2019. Ahead of the planning application submission date, the council plans to launch another round of public consultation on the project’s detailed design. An initial consultation on the proposals was carried out in 2015.
Construction of the first homes on the site will start in December 2019, followed by the course and its facilities opening on a phased basis. The municipal course is earmarked for a January 2020 opening, followed by the hotel in March 2020, and the championship course opening in April 2021.
The housing on the site will be delivered between 2019 and 2027. All of the construction contracts for the golf courses, hotel, and associated facilities are to be handled by Nicklaus Joint Venture Group (NJVG).
Leader of Wirral Council, Cllr Phil Davies, said: “The Hoylake Golf Resort will be a flagship development which will create hundreds of jobs for local people and support businesses across the borough. As a globally-significant tourism and leisure attraction, it will support growth in our vibrant tourism economy and attract thousands of additional visitors to Wirral every year.
“Working with partners with the expertise and reputation of Celtic Manor, arguably the strongest brand in golf hospitality today, and north-west based Story Homes means we are confident we will deliver a resort of the highest possible quality.
“This is another example of Wirral Council being commercial, ambitious and innovative. By using our resources and skills to secure major private sector investment into our borough, we will create jobs for residents and generate revenue for the Council.â€
Comments welcome.
I no longer live in Hoylake but am interested in residents reactions to this.
I know the Celtic Manor which is very successful but it’s very close to motorway.
Isn’t this green belt land? If this gets approved imagine what other green spaces they’ll be wanting to ‘develop’
I think this is fantastic news and we mustn’t allow a few obstacles to stand in the way of progress. It will add jobs, housing and boost the local economies. Yes there will be some transport and logistical issues that need to be overcome but lets give some credit to the council for at least having a vision.
No impact assessment has been done on businesses in Hoylake. Jobs and businesses may be lost. Council to borrow £26m to lend to developer that has a ZERO credit rating. This is Greenbelt and should be left green. This developer has a very dubious history. Find out all the facts. Traffic will be snarled up by the level crossing where new bypass joins. Council tax payers are paying for the road …. so many faults with this plan. It’s a zone 3 flood area….
Don’t worry about water hazards on the proposed Golf Course? Messing with the River Birkett and its flood plain will come back to bite the development in the future (a once in a hundred year event!). Perhaps the Council has forgotten why this land is zoned as Green Belt. Surely before anything happens the development area has to be rezoned from rural to urban with extensive consultations. A water logged golf course – what a legacy for the Council to leave for grandchildren and great grand children
I smell a rat when the only colours in the palette of the artist who did the oh-so-tasteful illustration are green and blue, despite there being 160 houses, clubhouse, academy etc.!
So this is Wirral Council democarcy in action according to their leader Phil Davies, is it? Has he not just been told by the people of the area to stuff his idiotic vanity project where the sun doesn’t shine and LISTEN to what the people actually think is a better idea put forward by Hoylake Vision? What a murky, deceitful, toxic administration Phil Davies heads, he must be very proud of the verbal promises he’s no doubt made behind closed doors to his ‘preferred’ development ‘partners’. So much for Hoylake having a neighbourhood plan and people who have given their time and efforts to try and make the town a better place and provide a better alternative than the smokescreen Wirral Council are trying to sell as a ‘Golf Resort’. Looks like Margaret Greenwood wasted her time, HV wasted their time, Stop The Golf Resort AG wasted their time and all the people who packed out Hoylake Community Centre wasted their time. The arrogance of the Council’s executive cabinet is sickening, to publicly pay lip service to a better idea and then to plough ahead with Plan A and all its flaws. But cash talks and that is all this is about. The only longevity to the Davies plan is an estate of Band H houses on Green Belt occupied by online shoppers, flooding downstream, more traffic pollution, a few minimum wage transient jobs and continued years of Hoylake as a ghost town. I really feel sorry for the HV people who have put so much effort into offering an alternative that offers longevity and a reason to connect potential footfall into Hoylake town centre and beyond. We have been well and truly shafted by the suits and their cheque books full of borrowed money. Perhaps the biggest kick in the balls is, we’ve been shafted by utter halfwits who are stupid enough to believe that we actually don’t know what’s going on. Well, they got the “open and transparent” bit right for sure – but perhaps not how they envisaged. Absolutely pitiful, my commiserations go to Hoylake Vision who obviously can’t represent the people of Hoylake better than the Phil Davies and his “commercial, ambitious and innovative” Cabal.
DID hoylake benefit in any way when it held the open?
I admit that when I first heard about this, it sounded like a good idea, but the more you delve into it, the more you realise it’s a bad development. Clearly, this is less about golf, than building 160 executive houses on green belt land (which happens to be on a flood plane). The builders have a poor track record and although it;s referred to as a Jack Nicklaus course, he only designed it, he has no other association with the developers. Ecologically, this is a disaster. Why are we now lending the developers £26 million.? The whole thing reeks of corruption to me and I don’t understand how the council leader, Phil Davies has got away with it.
Re-River Birkett flood plain. I believe, but will need confirming by a hydrologist – The River Birkett is born on Caldy Hill and flows underground in West Kirby. Its only surface expressions are the Ashton Park pond and the once-upon-a-time Lear Home pond before it surfaces at the back of Greenbank Road. Tampering or restricting the river’s natural flow could lead to back flow, especially in very wet weather, causing the River Birkett to show surface expressions in West Kirby with extensive flooding., especially in the Concourse vicinity..
It is a propossall,and that is all it ever will be? simaliar to sail hotel bottom of dee lane?
Let’s look at the statement in detail and analyse, what we are being told.
• A golf resort, with championship course – We already have ‘The Royal Liverpool ‘
• A municipal course – we already have that too
• 90 Bed hotel with spa and conference facilities we already have ‘Thornton Hall Hotel and Hilbark Hotel
• 40 Apartments and 160 houses – ah.. now we see what this is all about
• Celtic Manor will MANAGE the entire attraction, but not build it or own it? No Private Setor investment from them eh ?
• Story Homes will lead on building the homes. Look at some of the reviews here https://www.reviewcentre.com/New-Homes-and-House-Builders/Story-Homes-www-storyhomes-co-uk-review_8004567 They are not in the top 10 of national new home builders, with review like this you can see why.
• Jack Nicklaus Joint Venture is Nicklaus Joint Venture and has no connection to Jack Nicklaus, no trading accounts for the last 3 years, no assets and a poor track record in attempting a similar project in Wales. The homes got built, the builder went bust and local businesses were left owing hundreds of thousands of pounds. The hotel pulled out over concerns of flooding. Where is the due diligence from the council?
• The Hoylake Golf Resort will create hundreds of jobs – possibly 60 at most, low paid and seasonal
• The Hoylake Golf Resort will be a globally significant tourist attraction – golf or other niche sports do not appear in the top set of global tourist attractions.
• What private sector investment? The Council are lending the money, that is tax payers money.
• Creating more homes, before considering school places, GP patient waiting lists, hospital waiting lists, policing is fool hardy.
Local people do not want our valuable green belt and flood plain land built on. It is not that we don’t understand money needs to be raised, we do. Build on Brownfield sites 1st, parts of Birkenhead need investment long before West Kirby and Hoylake. Build things that will be used by many not by the few. Golf is in decline, more people cycle, swim and walk than play golf.
Hoylake Village Life have created a very viable scheme that would seek to put maintaining the importance of the Eco system at the forefront of any development proposal. The local council don’t want to know, because it is not their plan. They have done a really great job of the christmas Lights Why so desperate to push through plans to allow this flawed Joint Venture to go ahead and research this barmy and ill-conceived plan?
Local people will not rest
So how’s the golf resort coming along guys? still on track to open next year?.I noticed at the weekend that the squash centre still hasn’t opened on the site of the old bandstand, along with lots of other ideas over the years. Hoylake has never had any appetite for improvement and I don’t see that changing anytime soon.