City’s small business investment zone plan gets go-ahead

Alec Doyle, Local Democracy Reporter

A mini industrial estate that could become an incubator for a city’s small businesses to benefit from an Investment Zone has been approved.

Plans to demolish existing buildings at the Bridgeway Centre on Wrexham Industrial Estate and replace them with 43 modern units have been granted by Wrexham Council’s Planning Committee.

The plans have been in the pipeline since 2022 but since the announcement of the IZ – which aims to focus on developing advanced manufacturing across four sites in Flintshire and Wrexham to generate more than £1 billion of private sector investment and offer tax breaks for businesses – the site has now been identified as a potential in-road for smaller advanced manufacturing businesses and suppliers to establish their place in the supply chain and benefit from that investment.

Previously the plans had been held up due to concerns around the additional phosphates flowing into the River Dee catchment, however measures including water filtration, swales and slow permeable surfaces to regulate the water flow from the site have satisfied Natural Resources Wales.

“The size of some of these smaller units does mean it offers a potential for start-up businesses to establish themselves on the industrial estate,” said Head of Service for Planning Development Management Matthew Phillips.

“So if there are new businesses who are engaged in advanced manufacturing that only need a relatively small amount of floor space, it provides that as opposed to the units on the Wrexham Industrial Estate that are very sizeable.

“It gives the industrial estate something else and a different offer. So it provides some flexibility for the types of businesses the estate can attract.”