Shrewsbury's £184m Riverside shopping centre future in doubt
The future of Shrewsbury's new £184 million shopping centre complex was in severe doubt today.
The new Riverside complex is supposed to be completed by August 2017, with 50 shops including a flagship department store, 10 restaurants and a car park.
But it is believed funding issues have stalled the ambitious development, which would have competed with rival shopping towns like Telford.
Instead a new project has been launched in an effort to fill the empty shop units in the existing near-deserted shopping centre.
Shrewsbury social enterprise company Imagematch UK has been handed the keys to the Riverside until March 2017. Only Wilkinson and Cool Trader remain in the centre, which has seen Greggs, Co-op and Ryman all depart since plans to demolish the centre were first made public in 2011.
Construction work on the new Riverside development has already been put back once, with original plans for it to open at Christmas 2015. The deal with Imagematch means it will be 2017 before work can even start on any new development.
Imagematch today said it believes the redevelopment phase will still go ahead, and stressed its involvement is only short term.
Director Mark Gibson said: "This is an interim project. We wanted longer but were only given a three-year contract. It will be going ahead as far as we know."
Ignis Asset Management, speaking on behalf of the Riverside owner UK Commercial Property Trust, claimed in February a 2017 opening date was "still achievable". But it is believed it has failed to find sufficient funding to make it viable in the near future.
No-one connected with the project , which would have linked the Riverside to the Darwin and Pride Hill Centres, was willing to comment today.
