Multi-million plans for a huge new community park and 162-home development on the site of a former power station in Stalybridge have been submitted.

Landowner The Casey Group wants to redevelop a site which had held the Hartshead Power Station and Millbrook Sidings in a £7 million project.

They are aiming to create a new park across 62 acres of land in Millbrook, named the ‘Tame Valley Park’ which would serve the 35,000 residents of Stalybridge and Mossley.

However since being submitted there have been 19 letters of support and 85 objections lodged.

The industrial buildings and structures have been empty and derelict since the 1980s, and the site has a ‘brownfield legacy’ while being located within the green belt.

The Casey Group says there are dangers on the site, including exposed culverts, drains and manholes, piles of rubble and ‘isolated contamination’ from its previous heavy industrial uses.

This has meant that public access to the land has been mostly prohibited.

The proposed new housing estate would be split between 31, two-bed houses, 75, three bed and 55 four or more bedrooms.

These would be a range of affordable and open market properties, according to the planning documents.

Within the development there would be space for 162 cars, with the whole site being accessed off Crowswood Drive.

Under the park plans a ‘community hub’ could be built on the former Hartshead Power Station site, to the north of Spring Bank Lane, which was demolished in 1989.

This would include a ‘future activity zone’, ‘flexible’ event space, activity zone and play area, and allotments and community gardens, as well as a car park and toilets.

Nearby there would be an ‘ecology mitigation zone and wildlife refuge’.

The Casey Group says that nearly 40 acres of woodland vegetation would also be retained and improved.

CGI images of the proposed 162 homes. Photo: The Casey Group. 

In the place of the former Millbrook sidings to the north of the fishing ponds, there would be another ecology zone in the existing woodland and a potential golf course practice area created next to Stamford Golf Course.

The dismantled railway track would be converted into a shared footpath and cycleway to create a 1.3km section of the proposed cycling Bee Network.

The Casey Group says it will create a not for profit community enterprise to take possession of the Tame Valley Park land and oversee maintenance following completion of the project.

A design and access statement on behalf of the developer states: “The site represents a unique opportunity to re-purpose previously developed land that has a long industrial history for public and environmental benefit.

“Tame Valley Park will be not only a response to the need to physically remediate the site from its long history of industrial uses, but it will also utilise the site’s unique context and setting in the River Tame valley with the Huddersfield Narrow Canal, to create an attractive and more ecologically diverse environment.

“It will create opportunities to improve health and wellbeing by providing greater access to green space and the countryside; encouraging greater participation in physical activities, whether this is intensive and organised or more informal.”

The Casey Group had previously submitted a planning application for the site back in 2011 featuring 217 homes, but this was rejected by Tameside council.

Read more from the Tameside Reporter

Click here for more of the latest news

Click here to read the latest edition of the paper online

Click here to find out where you can pick up a copy of the paper