Regeneration news

Oldham's Hollinwood Junction gained a new Lidl on 3 December 2025, the first fresh food store to serve the junction since the old Kwik Save closed fifteen years ago. The discount chain's arrival gives households within a ten-minute walk an alternative to the Tesco Extra at Elk Mill, cutting the weekly shop journey for many residents who rely on buses.

Council leaders tied the supermarket opening to the wider Building a Better Oldham programme, a rolling scheme that has now channelled more than £90 million into refurbishing streets, shops and public buildings. While the Lidl is privately funded, planners required the chain to widen the junction's pedestrian crossing and pay £250,000 towards better bus stops, changes that bus-users will notice first.

The same regeneration pot is also reviving the Grade II-listed Old Library on Union Street. After standing fenced-off since 2018, the building will reopen in phases from spring 2026 as a combined exhibition hall and enterprise hub. Gallery Oldham has already staged a preview show charting the library's 137-year story, drawing 4,200 visitors in six weeks and proving the appetite for the space.

At June's Town Centre Forum the council revealed the next wave of projects: a new 350-space car park behind the Spindles shopping centre, a pocket park on the former Tommyfield toilets site, and compulsory purchase orders for three long-empty shop blocks if owners refuse to bring them back into use. No final contracts have been signed, so timetables could still slip, but officers insist work on the car park will start before next winter.