Halton Lea, Runcorn
Key facts
- Led by Halton Borough Council.
- Building 800 new homes, developing a ‘Health & Wellbeing Campus’.
- Brownfield site, mixed-use development and regeneration.
- Region: North-West.
Halton’s vision
In response to the Five Year Forward View to improve local health and integrate health and social care, we are building a connected Healthy New Town – connected by its people; connected by its aspirations; connected by its environment; connected by technology and connected by place. The development at Halton Lea, Runcorn, has the potential to regenerate the area into a thriving community hub, with new opportunities for social and community activities, healthy retail provision and integrated housing, health and social care provision. Our ‘One Halton’ model of care and support is focused on enhancing services in the community and ensuring easy access to those services. We are focusing on developing a health and wellbeing ecosystem, with people at the heart of it, and an infrastructure that supports wellbeing and health.
Priorities
- Developing a health and well-being campus, allowing the shift of care to less acute settings/homes at reduced cost and improved personal experience.
- Developing alternative commercial models and maximising use of existing NHS land to reduce capital pressures nationally.
- Build 800 new houses with up to 400 of these on the current hospital site. There will be a range of housing types to attract workers and supported housing, private, council and mixed tenure. An important aspect will be sensitivity to the built environment and place as a means of promoting health, wellbeing and independence.
- Making greater use of Runcorn Shopping City as a hub for the development of local commercial, training and employment opportunities, health messages and services for the community.
- Addressing lower than average educational attainment and higher unemployment present in Halton. As a consequence we hope to be able to grow our own workforce in Halton Lea. We intend to create a health academy which will address staffing shortages in health and social care.
What have Halton done so far (not exhaustive)?
- Commissioned a delivery strategy for a Masterplan from a consultancy (WYG). This Masterplan is for estates development.
- Run a global innovation design challenge. The winner, Citiesmode, proposed 15 practical and innovative ideas all interconnected and routed in the context of Halton. These will now all go before the community for consultation before potentially being added into the masterplan.
- Streamlined our governance structure including a programme board. Completed an initial analysis of baseline and assessment of services to be provided in the Health & Wellbeing Campus.
- Secured funding for 358 new homes from the Homes and Community Agency.
- Developed the Happy Places app to help promote wellbeing and social interaction. This has been piloted locally and we are in the process of collecting data to demonstrate its effectiveness with a view to using it to produce important case histories that demonstrate its role as a tool that enhances wellbeing and reduces loneliness.
- In the process of coordinating existing provision for community services via Well North. Healthy Halton, One Halton with HNT, using multiple facilities and services at Runcorn Shopping Centre as the Community Hub.
- Developing plans for major improvements to the Town Park. These will involve improved access and usage, particularly walking, running and cycling routes through what is a varied and interesting range of habitats and landscape.
- Submission of a Halton Healthy New Town Sustainability and Transformation Partnership Capital bid for the autumn tranche of funding.
What do Halton plan to do in the future?
- Develop a commercial model for redevelopment of the hospital site.
- Design of a specification for a health hub and develop a co-produced integrated health offer/ health hub.
- Develop a comprehensive masterplan for the town which incorporates healthy design principles. Stage 1 of the masterplan (familiarisation and Information gathering) is expected to be completed by early September.
- Produce a case study on community engagement and asset management.
- Introduce new care pathways.
- Increase use of Tele-health services.
- Identify surplus land for new homes.
- Deliver an employable skills programme for young people and those who are out of work.