New plan for flats at city centre location

MONEYCENTRE HAS HAS NOT BEEN FULLY USED FOR YEARS

- WILLIAM TELFORD

A FRESH bid has been made to turn Plymouth city centre's towering Moneycentre into more than 100 flats less than 18 months after it was earmarked to become a hotel.

The nine-storey building's "new owner" wants to exercise permitted development rights to transform seven floors of open-plan offices into 104 flats, with another apartment on the upper ground floor.

Manchester-based MCR Management Ltd's prior approval application to Plymouth City Council is not proposing to change the outside of the building or develop the closed former Mambo's nightclub, which adjoins the tower. It will, however, seek to retain the car park, with 47 spaces for cars and 148 for bikes, at the bottom of the structure.

In June last year, hotel developer THAT Group said it wanted to transform the building into a 168-bed Hampton by Hilton hotel, and aimed to have it open by 2025, but plans were never submitted and, when The Herald contacted the company in January this year for an update, it received no reply.