Plan for three residential towers on long-stalled site abandoned due to viability concerns
DLA’s plans to build three residential towers on the former Yorkshire Post site in Leeds have been reworked as offices in the latest planning twist to hit the long-delayed scheme.
Developer Prescient Capital has submitted a fresh planning application for a pair of 15 and 17-storey office blocks on the site, replacing DLA’s consented proposals for student accommodation and build-to-rent scheme rising up to 42 storeys.
The latest application is the third proposal for the site since the Brutalist former home of the Yorkshire Post was demolished in 2014 to make way for an office-led mixed-use scheme designed by Sheppard Robson.
The demolition of the well-known landmark, designed by John Madin, has left the site mostly vacant for more than a decade. Only the first phase of the Sheppard Robson scheme, an 18-storey residential block called The Headline, was completed.
DLA’s student accommodation rework was approved by Leeds council in 2023 and would have provided more than 1,700 student beds in two towers of 42 and 32 storeys and 348 build-to-rent homes in a third 25-storey tower.
The practice said Prescient’s strategy for the site had changed “following further market testing, discussions with both landowners and prospective developers, and further viability testing around scheme deliverability”.
The project team for the new scheme includes landscape architect Re-form with Quod acting as planning consultant, Roscoe as structural and civil engineer, Exigo as transport consultant, Waterman as MEP engineer and Design Fire Consultants as fire engineer.
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