IT has been six months since a major transformation of Birkenhead town centre got underway.

Covering two sites – Conway Street/Europa Boulevard area and Charing Cross/Grange Road/Grange Road West – the project is designed to make those areas more attractive to visitors and shoppers and improve accessibility and safety for all road users, including cyclists and pedestrians.

Funded from a combination of sources, including the UK government’s Future High Street Fund (FHSF) and Liverpool City Region Combined Authority’s Active Travel fund, the programmes will complement the wider Birkenhead regeneration plans that are already underway in the town.

The council says that efforts have been made to minimise disruption and inconvenience to residents, businesses and the public looking to spend time in central Birkenhead for shopping and leisure.

The contractor on the two schemes, Graham, is working to maintain pedestrian access to all businesses within the areas where works are taking place and the council say it will continue to liaise with all stakeholders to help them to do that “as smoothly as possible”. In some cases, work will take place outside of trading hours if it involves disrupting access to shop entrances.

While work on pedestrian access is underway, Birkenhead’s public transport and car parking facilities are all functioning as before to get people in and out of the town centre as quickly and conveniently as is possible.

The schemes are a third of the way through the 18-month timescale, with sections due to be completed soon.

The early parts of the preparation and groundworks included removing paving, drainage, street lighting, street furniture and other public realm elements that will be replaced and improved as part of the work.

By the time the schemes come to an end in 2025, people will see a town centre, which will include three times as many trees as were there before and the planting of thousands of new shrubs and plants. 

On Conway Street, between Hemingford Street and Argyle Street, there will be a full replacement of the footpath on the north side of the road and new trees planted. There will also be a segregated cycleway created on the north side of the road with better pedestrian and cycle crossing points along Conway Street. 

As part of the same scheme, the existing dual carriageway on Europa Boulevard will be reduced and a new cycleway created using the west side of the carriageway and two-way traffic being introduced on the east side of Europa Boulevard. This part of the scheme also includes replacement of the current paving.

The final part of this scheme will see the Europa Square car park reconfigured to provide a better, safer connection for pedestrians and cyclists between Birkenhead bus station and Conway Park railway station. It will result in the loss of 50 car parking spaces in the car park.

The other scheme is delivering improvements to Grange Road, Grange Road West and Charing Cross. On the busy junction of the three, which also includes Oxton Road, people will see improved pedestrian crossings and new paving installed, while on Grange Road there will also be new paving, as well as new trees planted. There will be an increased focus on preventing vehicles accessing this area outside of loading times.

As part of this scheme, a new one-way arrangement is being trialled on Grange Road West allowing traffic to drive down Grange Road West only in a westerly direction between Charing Cross and Clayton Street. As this part of the programme is a trial, residents will be able to provide feedback on its effectiveness before any decision is made as to whether the change will be made permanent.