Brighouse Town Centre Improvements - Your questions answered

A number of roads have now closed for the construction work to begin – Commercial Street (between Gooder Street and Park Street), Market Street, West Park Street, Bethel Street (from Park Street to Thornton Square), Briggate (from Thornton Square to the Aldi exit) and Canal Street (from Bethel Street to Ship Street).

Importantly, access will be maintained for deliveries with the Esh Construction team working closely with business and shop owners to ensure this can happen safely and efficiently.

There will still be access for shoppers, visitors and businesses on foot – the town centre is open for business as normal, even if it will look a bit different.

Esh Construction has their compound in Daisy Street Car Park. This uses the space that had been in use for the temporary market before it moved back to its permanent home. You’ll see a secure boundary and site cabins on the site. The rest of the car park, and all the businesses around the area, will be open as normal.

The UK Government awarded Brighouse £19.1 million pounds for very specific reasons – to improve streets and public spaces:

• A more attractive, safer and cleaner town centre so those who shop, visit and enjoy spend longer, spend more and return often
• A better, warmer welcome for those arriving on foot or bicycle, by bus or train, while retaining access for those who need to travel by car and improving signage to car parks on the edge of the town centre
• A brand new market housing the traders of today and the entrepreneurs of tomorrow
• A place to come together, providing an event and community space at the heart of the town in the historic Thornton Square
• A focus on the future with investment in apprenticeships, skills and training - building on the town’s manufacturing heritage

How to achieve that has been shaped by extensive consultation and engagement over the past six years to ensure the project balanced the aim that unlocks the investment – creating a place that is welcoming and pleasant to spend time, with a focus on people not cars, while continuing to give vital access to the town centre.

The project has been over six years in development and, in that time, there have been consultations, open days and workshops in July 2020, May 2021, October 2022 and May 2023: Full summary of the timeline of consultation and engagement.

Hundreds of people have been involved as part of these engagement processes, on issues like parking, traffic and access. The range of views has been broad – for example, some have suggested completely pedestrianising the town centre, whilst others have been against any pedestrianisation.

This has been led by the Brighouse Town Deal Board, made up of representatives from businesses and the community who all give their time and energy voluntarily, and to which we have recruited throughout the project.

We have had to balance and incorporate these views into proposals which met the ambition of encouraging more people to be able to safely shop, spend time and spend money in our town.

Substantial changes from the initial proposals have already been made based on feedback from the consultations and engagement exercises, and these are incorporated into the work.

The Brighouse BID has produced a map of car parks in the town centre – all of these remain open and available within just a few minutes walk of any shop or business.

There is also plenty of on-street parking, which remains available and accessible via Bethel Street and Bradford Road.

While the construction across the town centre will bring some challenges, we have worked hard to ensure the final completed scheme will improve accessibility for those who need it most. Some at the consultations were pushing for full pedestrianisation of the town centre, but this is not the route taken to ensure that Brighouse remains as accessible as possible, while being much more friendly for every visitor. Substantial changes from the initial proposals were made based on feedback, and some of them address specific concerns on parking and, in particular, disabled parking.  There are now significantly more spaces than were originally proposed by the designers – this recognises concerns about the importance of parking and ensuring people can access the town centre.

A substantial number of spaces have been added to the designs in various phases – these include additional spaces within Bethel Street Car Park (where the parklets were) next to the new market, further on-street spaces on Commercial Street (where a parklet currently is), and additional on-street spaces on Lawson Road, Gooder Street and Wakefield Road. These bays will be a mix, as they are now, of pay and display bays, dedicated loading bays to support shops and businesses (restricted to loading from 8 am to 6 pm and unrestricted outside those times), additional disabled bays in response to the need to provide easy access for those with mobility issues and shared loading/disabled bays.

Brighouse town centre remains open. There is a lot of on-street parking which remains available within the town centre. These spaces are accessible for cars from Bethel Street and Bradford Road and extend to Park Street, Commercial Street, King Street and Lawson Road. Diversion routes for vehicles to park or drop people off in the town centre are signed, and pedestrian access remains in all areas. The on-street spaces are still free to park for blue badge holders and without time limit. All our car parks remain open, including Bethel Street Car Park, which is centrally located and where parking for blue badge holders remains free and without time limit.

We know it is not currently possible to park on the streets in some parts of the town centre while the construction works take place. We hope for the vast majority all areas will remain accessible, and this was the feedback we had during the extensive engagement exercises, open days and drop-in sessions held in recent months and years.

If there are specific issues about access for particular reasons beyond the above, we can always look at anything extra that can be done. Esh Construction are on site daily and access for deliveries for shops and businesses, plus the emergency services, is being maintained at all times, so if there is a specific request, please contact the Brighouse Town Centre Improvements project team.

While the construction across the town centre will bring some challenges, we have worked hard to ensure the final completed project will improve accessibility. Some at the consultations were pushing for full pedestrianisation of the town centre, but this is not the route taken to ensure that Brighouse remains as accessible as possible, while being much more friendly for every visitor. Substantial changes from the initial proposals were made based on feedback, and some of them address specific concerns on parking and, in particular, disabled parking.  There are now significantly more spaces than were originally proposed by the designers – this recognises concerns about the importance of parking and ensuring people can access the town centre.

A substantial number of spaces have been added to the designs in various phases – these include additional spaces within Bethel Street Car Park (where the parklets were) next to the new market, further on-street spaces on Commercial Street (where a parklet currently is), and additional on-street spaces on Lawson Road, Gooder Street and Wakefield Road. These bays will be a mix, as they are now, of pay and display bays, dedicated loading bays to support shops and businesses (restricted to loading from 8am to 6pm and unrestricted outside those times), additional disabled bays in response to the need to provide easy access for those with mobility issues and shared loading/disabled bays.

Esh Construction have split the planned work into three phases – and it’s the first of these which is now underway.

This work will last through until the summer and will be followed by phase two until the end of the year, and phase three into spring 2027.

Construction plans for the future works, as outlined at the drop-in sessions at the end of 2025.

Yes.

It’s important to emphasise that the town centre is not being fully pedestrianised.

There will still be vehicle access for the vast majority of the town centre. There will be a better balance between pedestrians and visitors when they travel on foot and when they need to access the shops and businesses by vehicle.

The Town Deal investment is not just about the town centre improvements.

Brighouse’s new market is open and has been a hive of activity over the festive period. Packed with stalls offering food, drink, crafts and much more, it’s quickly become an important hub for our town.

Delivering the new market building is a key achievement of the Town Deal, as is a focus on skills and apprenticeships for the future as part of the Brighouse Industry 4.0 and Skills Hub.

We love Brighouse, and it is performing incredibly strongly as a town centre compared to many others. Brighouse had the opportunity to get nearly £20 million to future-proof our town – this is not money that would have been available for anything else, like filling in potholes, but is completely ring-fenced for the particular aims agreed by the UK Government.

Since that point, Calderdale Council and the Town Deal Board – made up of representatives from businesses and the community who all give their time and energy voluntarily, and to which everyone was able to apply to join, have spent over six years putting together the plans.

We’ve put together a timeline of the work that has been happening since 2019 when the Brighouse Town Deal began, setting out where we are now and what’s still to come.

You can also see the huge range of consultations, engagement exercises and discussions that have been had about the project over the years.

We recognise not everyone agrees with every aspect of the transformation, and we also know construction work will be disruptive, but we are determined to work with everyone to deliver a town centre we can be proud of long into the future.

Please email us. The project team will reply as soon as they can.

You can find out about The Brighouse Deal, the six years of consultation and engagement that have happened, and the other projects. 

You can find out about the Brighouse Town Deal Board, what it does and who is on the board. 

Details of other projects in Brighouse and across Calderdale, such as the A641 Improvement Scheme are available too.