Watford Health Campus – The Masterplan

The vision for West Watford

The Watford Health Campus masterplan aims to deliver a comprehensive regeneration programme for West Watford. The redevelopment will see the West Watford area reconnected to the town centre. Currently much of the 26.5 hectares of land is poorly used, but through careful design, this can be transformed into a quality environment to live, work and play in. When completed, the Health Campus will include:

• A new 510 bed hospital, costing around £320 million, to replace the existing Watford General Hospital
• A specialist women's and children's unit delivering 6,000 births per year
• A new mental health unit to replace the existing Shrodells Mental Health Unit built in the 1960s
• Primary, intermediate and diagnostic services
• New offices for health agencies

In addition, the project includes a number of other initiatives on adjacent land, including:

• 300 new homes, including homes for health and key workers
• New business, leisure and recreation premises
• An enhanced stadium and environment for Watford FC
• Space for new and expanding businesses, especially those linked to healthcare delivery
• Hotel, leisure and hospitality services
• A new combined heat and power plant

Improved transport and highways infrastructure are integral to the project in order to reduce congestion and promote increased public transport use. The plans also include a green travel plan, to ease traffic congestion and more public green space for the community.

West Watford is a built up urban area in need of regeneration and blighted by traffic congestion. A key ambition of the masterplanis to ‘green’ West Watford.

The plan aims to:

• Retain and improve existing working allotment gardens
• Create significant new landscaped public open spaces
• Enhance access to existing and newly created green open spaces
• Enhance and create lake and riverside walks and access
• Enhance and create new habitats to encourage bio-diversity