Deal signed for 4,500 homes by shopping centre

Thousands of homes are to be built around a shopping centre after a deal to create a new neighbourhood was signed.

Metro Riverside will see 4,500 homes constructed near the Metrocentre in Gateshead along with additional transport infrastructure and leisure offerings.

The public-private partnership was struck with the site's owners and Gateshead Council, with the aim of creating what has been described as "a carbon-neutral urban district".

The shopping centre's chairman Martin Healy said it would "unlock transformational change" in the area.

"Developments of this scale and ambition simply cannot be delivered in isolation," he said.

"By working in partnership with Gateshead Council and others, we can bring together long-term investment, local leadership and shared purpose to create a new dense, urban community that delivers homes, jobs and opportunities, while ensuring Metrocentre continues to evolve as a major economic engine for the region for decades to come."

The company described the scheme as one of the largest and most ambitious urban regeneration projects in Britain outside the M25 and marked the north-east of England as a target for "large-scale investment".

The area, located three miles (5.8km) from the Newcastle-Gateshead quayside, will see brownfield sites regenerated into housing and mixed-use buildings.

It is being designed as a "20-minute destination" - an area where all people's essential needs are within a 20-minute walk.

The project will see a "re-imagined Metrocentre" sit at the heart of the neighbourhood, offering retail, leisure, hospitality, workspaces, education and renewable energy to those living nearby.

The redevelopment has already been highlighted as one of the central pillars of the Labour-led council's regeneration plan and has been identified as a major housing scheme in the North East Combined Authority's Local Growth Plan.

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