Work starts on homes at cement site

An old cement works in one of Scotland’s top property hotspots is being 

turned into hundreds of luxury homes.

A fleet of bulldozers has moved in to start work on the former site of 

Castle Cement, in Coatbridge.

House prices soared by more than a third last year in the Lanarkshire town, 

where the average cost of a house is now £110,000.

Regeneration specialists at Durham-based Banks Development have now started 

clearing the 32-acre site at the old cement works.

Demolition work is due to go on for a year and is expected to cost around 

£7million before the site’s transformation into a new luxury housing estate 

in a £20m makeover.

The industrial scar will be replaced by more than 260 new homes, a mix of 

two, three and four bedroom houses - detached, semis and terraced - and a 

number of apartments.

House buyers can expect to pay between £140,000 and £220,000 for a property 

at Castle View, in Coltswood Road.

The multi-million pound project is being headed by senior executives at 

Banks Development’s Scottish headquarters in Hamilton.

Colin Anderson, Scottish director of the firm, said: "Our team have been 

working hard to put the finishing touches to the technical brief and it is 

good to see work now taking place on site.

"The Castle Cement site is just one of the sites we are currently looking to 

develop within North Lanarkshire and it is great to see the first of these 

come to fruition.

"We are also looking to develop further land in areas including Wishaw, 

Glenboig and Carfin."

The firm was granted planning permission by North Lanarkshire Council this 

year and building is due to start in early 2007.

The company claims to be a leader in brownfield regeneration and recent 

planning successes include approval to build 600 homes at the Clydesdale 

Steelworks site in Cambuslang, 166 homes at the Etna Ironworks in Wishaw and 

another 107 at Carfin Industrial Estate in Mothewell.