The governors of Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU) have now decided to progress with the sale of the Ryebank Fields site and has begun to market the site to developers through agents Cushman & Wakefield.  

Should development go ahead, the CLT wishes to engage proactively with MMU and their selected development partner to achieve an exemplar scheme at Ryebank Fields. 

We acknowledge that some people in our community, including some CLT members, are opposed to any development on Ryebank Fields. To ensure we have appropriate support, the CLT surveyed its members last month and has secured a mandate to engage in the process and to aim for a development that exceeds the Development Framework adopted for the site by Manchester City Council. 

The CLT Board believe that a high-quality development on this site, building on the expectations of the Development Framework, can raise the bar for sustainable low carbon community living alongside nature within the City of Manchester.

To this end, we have captured the views of members from the Early Feedback Engagement Survey and fed these into an overarching Expectations and Aspirations Statement that sets out our broad position as we begin to engage in the development process, given the Development Framework’s commitment for developers to “work with a local community housing group to develop part, or all of the site” and to ensure there is “extensive engagement with the local community”.