In 2023, Riverside Housing gifted three listed buildings along with some land in historic Bromborough Pool Village to Autism Together.

Autism Together is a charity that supports autistic people by providing autism-specific services and housing. In Bromborough Pool Village we now own the school, church, village hall, café, shop and some of the surrounding land.

The buildings are in need of significant repair and refurbishment to bring them back to full use. Following a community consultation held at the end of 2023, Autism Together appointed Paddock Johnson, heritage-approved architects, to design a masterplan for the buildings and land.

Below, you can see details from this plan, showing the exciting future potential of the village, which will benefit both our Day Services, operating within these buildings, and the village as a whole.

St Matthew’s Church Zone

Originally a non-denominational chapel for the workers of Prices Candle Factory, the church was built in 1889/90, it closed for worship in 2007. Autism Together leased the church from Riverside since 2008, with it transferring into Autism Together’s ownership in 2023.

Within the church, which is currently used for music and media sessions for the people we support, we would look to improve the usefulness of the interior of this building for our groups by introducing a reversible change, of an acoustic glazed partition, enabling the space to be accessed and used to do different activities at the same time.

This area includes the Bromborough Pool Village café and shop, the rear area, which is used by the people we support, along with the old community growing area and carpark.

Car park improvements and person we support entrance – We would aim to replan the carpark space to develop a one-way system and specific drop off area in the old bowling hut, for the people coming to the services in the day, minimising the impact that the traffic has on the village during the busy drop off and collection periods. We would also look to resurface with improved sub-bases and a new permeable surface with integrated planting to ensure that it is aesthetically pleasing.

The person we support entrance would be redesigned to give a clear visual to the people with Autism that we are supporting that this is the entrance to their service, enhanced with clear directional signage, along with a modular build office to assist with support for the people we support entering the area.

The area behind the café and shop – This area would be zoned to provide different experiences for the people we support, this would include a sensory area, with individual pods for people we support that need different sensory input. There would be an exercise zone, with sunken trampolines, an all-weather track for cycling and outdoor gym equipment would provide people we support with purposeful activity that addresses vestibular sensory differences. There would be an animal area for small animals that reside on the site (rabbits, guinea pigs and chickens), keeping these provides jobs for the people we support in looking after them and they are very popular with the petting sessions that happen in the café for the community.

There would be a further growing area, allowing for the current activity of growing plants from seed to continue as well as a social area for the people we support to gather. All of these areas will be supported by various modular classrooms that will provide areas for the people we support to have quality facilities to underpin the learning and development.

Finally we intend to have a work skills area, which will be a multi-functional space that will facilitate further opportunities for the interaction between people we support and the community, with a number of modular classrooms and pods that could be used to host the community events that we been running, such as the summer activities and Santa’s grotto.

Café, shop and Community Growing Space – As well as our café and shop that we have, we intend to develop a managed community growing space, which will the local community to adopt small plots of land that they can use to grow items. We will manage the rental of these spaces and preference will be given to people living in the village.

Urban Garden Zone

This is the area of land that currently sits behind the garages which are of very poor quality and structure. The garages and the parcel of land, which is currently very underused due to a lack of facilities transferred into Autism Together’s ownership from Riverside in 2023. Our desire is, that in the future this could see the garages demolished and an attractive new single-story building developed that is in keeping with the design of the village, that would enhance our residential offer to the people with Autism that we support in the form of a new supported living service for 8 individuals.

What we have done so far in response to the public consultation.

• War Memorial repaired
• Tree and hedge trimming
• Renewed all the railings to car park
• Expanded the range of goods sold in the café to include – milk, bread and newspapers
• More events happening for children
• More visitors to the village – this is due to the events.
• Corporate volunteers tidying up general area in August

What improvements will be made to the local area (outside of our buildings)

• Car park area will be much improved
• Restoration to exterior of buildings
• Improvements to the boundaries
• Falling down buildings (in car park, garages and rear of GSH) will be improved, generally improving the look.
• Rentable space in the Enterprise Centre

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