Early test work has started on a notorious Nottingham eyesore which could be bought by a council.
Nottingham City Council announced in June in wants to force the owners to sell the derelict Island Site between London Road and Manvers Street.
It is home to the decaying James Alexander Warehouses, which were once home to the Jesse Boot empire.
The derelict grade II listed building has had a number of different owners since the departure of Boots, but the latest landlord has not started work on the site eight years after a planning application was granted.
The council now says it has already started ground testing of the site as it plans a ‘compulsory purchase order’ – a forced sale.
A council spokesman said: “Works will involve three weeks of drilling and trial holes across various areas of the site so as to conduct tests on the condition of the land, including soil quality, any gas build up or other issues which might affect its development.
“These tests will take roughly four weeks to complete once the sampling of the site is completed.”
They added a “range of developers” had already expressed an interest in the site since the council said it hopes to buy it.
The works will assess the site’s suitability for plans set out in the council’s ‘masterplan’ for the site, which proposes apartments, offices, commercial premises, and improved streets and greenspaces.
Council Leader Councillor Jon Collins said: “The Island site is one that clearly hasn’t progressed as it should. The site has enormous potential and rather than wait for something to happen, we’re getting our ducks in line in the long compulsory purchase order process by assessing the viability of the site for the type of high quality developments we’re looking to encourage in the city.
“We’ve had interest from developers keen to work with us to make that happen, and getting these works done should start to firm those plans up.
“The owners are welcome to keep talking to potential developers themselves, as we’d hope they would, but we are ready to step in to prevent the site stagnating further.”
Heathcote Holdings Limited, who own the land, have not commented since the council announced it wants to buy the land.
