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Search the Public Notice PortalDisused office space next to a section of the Leeds and Liverpool Canal in Blackburn could be turned into a community hub.
Plans submitted to Blackburn with Darwen Council show that a new tenant is looking to take over the former offices in the Bobb Watts Building on the canal’s Nova Scotia Wharf, off Bolton Road.
The large three-storey building, otherwise called the Environment Centre, was vacated by social enterprise firm Newgrounds in 2024 after occupying the site for close to 30 years, moving to a more central space on Wharf Street.
According to a change-of-use application submitted by firm Urban Future Planning Ltd, it could now become a multi-purpose community hub with a range of facilities that are ‘educational, social and wellbeing-focused’.
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The applicant intends to convert the interior into a flexible space that will deliver community services including: skills training, youth services, nursery provision, and a cafe.
“These uses are intended to operate as a coordinated community hub, serving local residents and providing a range of accessible services within a single location,” the submission states.
This proposed multi-purpose venue will refashion the ground floor with services such as a health and wellbeing counselling service, pre-booked meeting spaces, a library, a creche, and a prayer room.
In a transport plan for the development, it states that this prayer room ‘will function solely as an ancillary facility for users of the community centre. It will not operate as a primary place of worship.’
On the first floor, the plan envisions creating a youth club, with adjoining spaces for benefits and CV support.
The applicant is also seeking to create computer room on the same floor with a focus on adult learning during the day, functioning as a madrasa in the evening. The unnamed applicant organisation would occupy the second floor.
Bolton Road’s proposed new social hub states that is seeking to be able to open from 8.30am to 9pm every day of the week, in its application to change the use of the Nova Scotia Wharf building.
It states elsewhere in its submission that it currently intends to be open until 2.30pm, reopening at 5.30pm to provide further community services.
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