Relocating Shrewsbury’s fire station to two new sites could cost up to £9 million and the existing building should be refurbished instead, it was claimed today.
Shropshire and Wrekin Fire Authority chairman Stuart West made the claim yesterday.
Multi-million pound plans for the future of fire service cover in Shrewsbury have been out to consultation over the last few months.
The proposals focus on the possibility of revamping the existing St Michael’s Street fire station or moving to two new sites.
Councillor West was speaking after a meeting of the authority’s integrated risk management plan group. He said it voted to retain and refurbish the existing fire station as this was likely to cost about £3.5 million. “The cost of moving was horrific,” he said.
A final decision will be made at a full meeting of the fire authority on December 19.
If the fire station is moved, one option would be for two new fire stations - one in the north of the town and the second to the south.
This month fire service managers said staff had a balanced view over the issue.
However, members of the public were generally understood to have the viewpoint that the existing site should be refurbished, they said.
Managers also said they looked at a number of sites if the decision was taken to relocate. One location on the list of those being investigated is known to be the site of Shropshire Martial Arts Centre in Sundorne.
Shrewsbury and Atcham Borough Council, which owns the site, has agreed to offer the site to the fire station to see if it could make use of it before it is placed for sale on the open market.
2 Comments
The Fire Station needs to be moved, it is not unusual for St Micheals St
to be grid locked in both directions,
this makes it very difficult for emergency vehicles to respond quickly .
9 million is not a great deal if it saves lives!
Agreed that £9million is a ridiculous amount of public money. However, Shrewsbury can be much better served by having two fire stations, thus reducing response times to all parts of the town and also preventing appliances from being gridlocked.
Can this be offset and if so by how much by the sale of the St Michael’s site? I beleive some other brigades have done deals with developers whereby the developers have hepled with the cost of new replacement stations. Is this an option for Shropshire?
I also believe that Private Finance Initatives have been used to subsidise new or refurbished stations in other brigades.