By Charlotte Green, Local Democracy Reporter
OLDHAM Council is appointing a design team to create a new venue for the Oldham Coliseum in Grade Two listed buildings in the town centre.
Leaders agreed to appoint an architect-led team which will develop the detailed plans for a new ‘flexible’ performance space in the town’s ‘cultural quarter’.
This will be based in a redeveloped Old Post Office and former Quaker Meeting House at 84 Union Street and aspires to be a ‘net-zero carbon enterprise’.
The project is being primarily funded by £6.13million from the £24.4m cash windfall the council received from the government’s Towns Fund.
However the remainder of the costs is being provided by ‘council resources and match funding’, according to cabinet documents.
Bosses say it will provide a venue for local arts and culture providers, including acting as a new home for the Oldham Coliseum Theatre.
Original plans, first laid out under then council leader Jim McMahon to move the theatre into a state-of-the-art purpose built venue costing £27m were shelved in 2018.
The council says the new proposed performance space will expand the existing performing arts offer in terms of scope, scale and quality and increase provision for activities.
Chiefs say it will play a ‘significant role in post-Covid-19 recovery’ and they hope it will serve an audience across Oldham, Greater Manchester and West Yorkshire.
The ‘multi-disciplinary’ design team – the identity of which is currently restricted – will need to progress the plans in order to have them ready for a full business case submission to the Towns Fund in May 2022.
Council leader Arooj Shah said it was an ‘important next step’ in preparing for a planning application.
Cllr Shaid Mushtaq, cabinet member for education and skills, said: “Effectively the current Coliseum will be moving into that space and hopefully will be the main performance space for Oldham.
“We all have a role to play in increasing and improving the perception of the cultural offer in Oldham and I think a space like this is a really important because it sends out the right message that we are serious about culture.”
There’s already an existing and barely used but perfectly adequate performance space in the Gallery, why do they need to spend more money on another one ?