Why has this 'prime development site' gone to rack & ruin?

FORMER POLICE HQ HAS STOOD EMPTY & DECAYING FOR FOUR YEARS

- By JONATHAN BLACKBURN

The abandoned entrance steps are in a poor state

NEGOTIATIONS over the future of Merseyside Police's former city centre headquarters are still “ongoing”, more than four years after the force left the site.

The 10,000sqm plot, at the junction of Liverpool ONE, the Albert Dock and the Baltic Triangle, has been described as being among the best urban development sites in the country for more than a decade - but still stands empty and decaying as talks continue over its future.

Weeds are bursting through the car park, gates and fences are rusting, and doors are boarded up, years after the force left for its new HQ at Rose Lane in Everton in October 2021. The main eight-storey block, occupied by thousands of police staff for four decades, stands empty and silent over the Strand, its windows blank or covered with reflective plastic sheets.

In June 2025, Merseyside Police and Crime Commissioner Emily Spurrell announced that Homes England, the government's housing and regeneration agency, had been chosen from 13 entities as the “preferred bidder” for the site. Six months on, the Police and Crime Commissioner's office says negotiations are “ongoing” as Homes England continues to draw up plans for the site.

Ms Spurrell told the ECHO that, while there are “visible signs of disrepair” at the site, it remains “safe, secure and stable’ and is actively being maintained. She added that selling a site of the size and significance of Canning Place is a “complex process” and that a period of due diligence and detailed survey work is being carried out.