A NEW plan for the regeneration of the town centre has been unveiled today.

Council leader Michael Jones has announced a plan to offer for sale two sites in the town centre for developers to come up with plans for leisure schemes on the plots. The sites are Churchill Way car park and Duke Street car park.

This is a major overhaul to the previous town centre regeneration plan and a much-reduced scheme. Coun Jones said it’s most likely that only one of the sites will be developed and each site is just a third of the size of the previous development area.

Churchill Way car park. Google Street view.

The previous ‘Silk Street’ plan had more focus on retail, with around 20 shops and a Debenhams department store, as well as a town square and the leisure element which was to include a multi-screen cinema.

But the new scheme will be focused on leisure, with a cinema still possible if developers come up with proposals to accommodate one.

Coun Jones said the plan will happen ‘as quickly as possible’

He said: “This is a good day for Macclesfield.

“We are putting up both sites to give maximum opportunity for developers to come up with leisure-led schemes, which will be sensitive to the heritage of Macclesfield.”

An artists impression of the original £90 million Silk Street scheme for Macclesfield town centre

The council was working on the previous ‘Silk Street’ scheme with developer Wilson Bowden.

The plan started to fall apart earlier this year when Debenhams pulled out. Coun Jones said negotiations continued with Wilson Bowden but revealed today their contract formally ended within the last few days. The planning permission granted in 2013 will be scrapped for a new application once a developer has been picked.

Town centre regeneration was first mooted a decade ago and residents have been sceptical about whether a new scheme will go ahead.

Coun Jones said: “Ten years was unacceptable. Had we moved earlier the Debenhams scheme may have gone ahead. It’s nothing to do with Macclesfield, it’s to do with the way things are in retail and economics. But now the timing is right and we have fantastic momentum.

“We already have developers making us offers. There is great confidence in Macclesfield.”

A Town Centre Vision Design Board led by commercial property expert Nick Hynes has been working with town groups and retailers to advise the council.