Plans to demolish 14 shops, the parking lot and the Northway Market of Eccles Shopping Centre are gathering pace.
The planning team at Salford City Council aim to make a formal decision on the demolition this May.
They plan to start knocking down the northern part of the shopping centre, which is 66,000 square feet, in September. Around a third of Eccles Shopping Centre will be demolished; the other part of the centre will stay open for three more years.
The precinct is currently 50 per cent vacant, with the planning application documents labelling it “unattractive and unfit for purpose.”
The plan to improve the area will focus mainly on building homes, as well as adding new public spaces and facilities for the community to use, adhering to the wider regeneration project currently taking place throughout Salford.
Susan Moore, 72, who’s lived in Eccles all her life, said: “It is terribly sad for those of us from Eccles to see the character of a once thriving busy town demolished, taking with it a community where people actually talked to each other and enjoyed it.
“Us old enough to remember will always mourn the passing of the character of Eccles, which has sadly been replaced by a meaningless emptiness which is only relevant to the developers who do not live in Eccles.”
Janet Newton, owner of Kiss n Make-up: a stall in Eccles market, believed the council could have done more to help local businesses.
She said: “The council could have helped us more and they could still be helping us more. The plans have killed local businesses, just look how dead the precinct is now even from three or four weeks ago.
“Business now is dead, dire, it’s dropped so much in the past few weeks all because of the shops that are closing.
“It’s worse now than during covid, we’re sat here hours on end, not even making a wage.”
Eccles resident Francis O’Loughan, 80, said: “There is nothing here now and it’s a shame it used to be a good place for shopping but now there is nowhere to go.
“It needs some development and more shops open, it used to be a lovely place it’s such a shame.”
However, Salford resident, David Fellowes, 52, believes the proposed demolition and revamp is desperately needed.
He said: “This has been a long time coming and is well needed. The car park has been in a state of disrepair for over 10 years, leaking water into the shops below.
“Look at the precinct, it’s a ghost town with only a few shops left. People are understandably upset for the old Eccles lost but this isn’t coming back and the new Eccles is the future.
“Hopefully the developers will listen to local people when developing the new Eccles so that it ends up being a decent place to live, work and play.”
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