As part of the Department of Health’s national target for 26,000 homes to be built on NHS land, NHS England’s Healthy New Towns programme aims to show how this land can be used, not just to build homes but also to benefit local communities and the wider healthcare system.
In March 2016, Halton Lea in Runcorn - where Halton Hospital and the Brooker Centre are based - was one of 10 sites nationally to be awarded Healthy New Town status by NHS England.
Since then a project board has been established to agree what Halton Healthy New Town will look like and there have already been a number of meetings with local partners, which our Trust is represented at through your Assistant Director Lindsey Maloney and our Director of Strategy and Organisational Effectiveness Tracy Hill.
We are closely involved with the Healthy New Town programme and will be playing a key role in its development to influence decision making and ensure the needs and views of our staff and service users are represented at the highest level.
The long term vision is for the development of a Hospital and Wellbeing Campus at the Halton Hospital site, which will integrate mental health, physical health and social care and will include a redeveloped, modern hospital facility to house both mental and physical health services, along with a range of additional facilities to benefit the local community.
We will be adding to this page as the programme develops. If you have any questions about the Halton Healthy New Town development, please send these to communications@nwbh.nhs.uk for inclusion in our frequently asked questions, which you can view below.
The long term vision for the Healthy New Town is for a new Hospital and Wellbeing Campus at the existing Halton Hospital site, which will integrate mental health, physical health and social care.
After months of work and a number of public consultation events, the Healthy New Town project team has now finalised two possible proposals for the Halton Hospital and Wellbeing Campus site plan.
Both of these proposals include the provision of our Trust's inpatient and community-based services at the campus site, along with a range of other facilities that will benefit the local community, including a leisure centre, community hub, care home, nursery, allotments, green space and around 800 residential units.
The proposals for the site were developed based on a £40m application for funding to the Department of Health and Social Care as part of a national NHS capital funding programme. The funding allocation was announced on 28 March 2018 and unfortunately, Halton's bid was unsuccessful.
While this is obviously disappointing, we will continue to work with our partners in Halton to consider how the project could be funded, and remain fully supportive of the proposals to redevelop the Halton Hospital site as a first-of-its-kind, integrated hospital and wellbeing campus to benefit the local community of Halton.
We would like to reassure staff that North West Boroughs Healthcare's inpatient and community health services which are based at the Brooker Centre will continue to be provided at the new Halton Hospital and Wellbeing Campus if the proposals go ahead. These long-term development plans will not impact or fundamentally change our service delivery.
The current proposals for Halton Hospital and Wellbeing Campus include a hospital and dedicated mental health facility, meaning that if the plans do go ahead, the Brooker Centre would be redeveloped as a brand-new, modern mental health facility to house all the inpatient and community services which are currently based there.
We have made it very clear from the start that, while we very much welcome the idea of the Halton Hospital and Wellbeing Campus and the benefits it will bring to the local community, we would not want to lose any services or beds as a result of the developments. We are pleased that Warrington and Halton Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, Halton Council and all our partners have been fully supportive of this.
We have also been reassured that there would be no disruption to services as a result of any future development works and it's important to bear in mind that the visions for the campus are long term plans which are looking 10 to 15 years into the future.
After months of work and a number of public consultation events, the Healthy New Town project team has now finalised two possible proposals for the Health and Wellbeing Campus site plan and will be sharing these with staff, local councillors and the public for feedback before a final decision is made.
Both of these proposals include the provision of our Trust's inpatient and community-based services at the campus site, along with a range of other facilities that will benefit the local community, including a leisure centre, community hub, care home, nursery, allotments, green space and around 800 residential units.
The proposals for the site were developed based on a £40m application for funding to the Department of Health and Social Care as part of a national NHS capital funding programme. The funding allocation was announced on 28 March 2018 and unfortunately, Halton's bid was unsuccessful.
While this is obviously disappointing, we will continue to work with our partners in Halton to consider how the project could be funded, and remain fully supportive of the proposals to redevelop the Halton Hospital site as a first-of-its-kind, integrated hospital and wellbeing campus to benefit the local community of Halton.
Find out more...
Download the full presentation from the Halton Healthy New Town staff event on 21 March, with artists impressions and site maps for the proposed Halton Hospital and Wellbeing Campus.