Sarah Townsend
The developer involved in the £1.4bn regeneration of Manchester’s Mayfield depot is to restructure after posting a £50m loss for the six months ended 30 September 2020. Chief executive Matthew Weiner has stood down with immediate effect.
Weiner, who said he leaves “to pursue other opportunities”, has been replaced by Richard Upton, currently chief development officer, who assumes his new role with immediate effect. Upton was the founder and chief executive of developer Cathedral Group, which U+I acquired in May 2014.
As his first task in the role, Upton has commenced a 100-day review of the business to cut costs and refocus the company’s activities solely on regeneration projects. The findings of the review are to be announced in the full-year results on 26 May.
Report finds data problems in Brownfield Land Registers
More than 348,000 homes could be built on unregistered brownfield land, an investigation has revealed.
A new report by regeneration specialist U+I has uncovered problems with the quality and consistency of data in Brownfield Land Registers (BLRs).
This includes how the data is uploaded within a number of local authorities, with some including sites unsuitable for development. It also found some councils were omitting sites because of a lack of clear guidance or incorrectly assigning site ownership.
The report warns this is preventing the construction of new homes as private companies use BLRs to identify potential development sites.