The council’s planning committee gave a resounding thumbs up for the new Saints stadium which St. Helens Council hopes will take the rugby club and the town into a new era.
 
The triple planning application from developer Langtree, retailer Tesco and housebuilder Taylor Wimpey was approved subject to conditions. The application, one of the biggest ever received by the council, includes major regeneration plans for the town centre

It will transform the currently derelict 46-acre former United Glass site in St Helens into a £25m, 18,000 capacity stadium, with a mix of seating and standing, for St Helens Rugby League Club.

It will also include a multi-million pound Tesco Extra. The town centre's current Tesco outlet on Chalon Way will then be redeveloped into alternative retail outlets, further regenerating the town centre. As part of a separate plan, a high quality residential area will be built by Taylor Wimpey, replacing the historic Knowsley Road, which has been Saints' home for 116 years.

However the council has made preservation and restoration over an ancient kiln known as Cannington Shaw No7 Bottle Shop, which is officially designated an ancient monument by English Heritage, one of the conditions for their approval of the scheme when the north-west regional planning office considers whether to send it to London for consideration by the central government in the coming months.

John Downes, managing director of Langtree said: "This is fantastic news, and is a vital step forward in our plans to transform the former United Glass site.

The planning application is the product of a lot of hard work over the last few years by everyone involved and the result will be a fantastic new development with the new Saints Stadium as its centrepiece.”

Whilst we still need to resolve the future of the Ancient Monument as the Council are requiring us to consolidate and repair it which is not viable for the development to support, the proposals will now go to the Government Office for the North West for their consideration and obviously we hope for a speedy positive result.”