First look at Nuneaton town centre's new food hall as construction milestone hit
A first glimpse has been given of Nuneaton's first food hall. It is being built on land where part of the Co-op department store used to stand in Abbey Street.
The steel frames for the food hall, which will play home to a number of eateries, are now in place. CoventryLive was given access to the construction site where phase 2 of the Grayson Place development is taking place.
The first phase of the huge regeneration project was the creation of the Hampton-by-Hilton hotel. The 145-bed hotel, the first of its kind in the town, opened in September last year.
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Now a new milestone has been hit - Nuneaton and Bedworth Borough Council has signed the contract with BAM Construction to deliver the second phase of the project.
This includes the food hall, which will eventually have a full glass front which will face out onto a new 'public realm' area with seating. When it was first announced, it was billed as a Liverpool GPO-style food hall with a number of different concessions inside.
The two-storey will have balconies which will allow for outdoor dining, as well as indoor. Members of the council's planning committee had initially raised eyebrows about this, with one dubbing it a food factory before the plans were officially given the go-ahead.
The vision is for the food hall to complement the North Warwickshire and Hinckley College restaurant, which is being moved from the Hinckley Road-based campus.
The college restaurant will form part of the new multi-million pound digital skills and innovation hub, which is also being built on the site.