Smith & Nephew plans for new Yorkshire site 'won't just be a box in a field'

Smith & Nephew’s planning application for a new site for its Advanced Wound Management arm, in Melton Business Park, has been submitted to East Riding Council. Documents stated the company wanted the building to celebrate its Hull history and not just be a box in a field. The plans come after Smith & Nephew announced their move from its existing site in Hull’s Hessle Road earlier this year which they said they had now outgrown.

The plans propose a three storey facility with manufacturing and research and development facilities for operations which include making products to treat burns and ulcers for clients including the NHS.

The company has pledged to invest almost £100m in the new site to replace its existing one in Hull, where the company was founded in 1856. Smith & Nephew’s new site would cover more than 39,000sqm of internal floor space on an almost 10ha plot of undeveloped grassland in the north west of Melton Business Park. The A63 borders the site in the north with the village of Melton beyond it, with the nearest homes about 700m away in Welton.

Planning documents stated the current Hull site, made up of nine different buildings, had developed over its 100-year history making it disjointed and inefficient. They added it was no longer fit for purpose, hemming in further expansion and sometimes flooding.

Documents stated the relocation to Melton Business Park would allow Smith & Nephew to put all advanced wound management operations in a single building, including research and development and production. The outside of the building would be covered in either metal blades or mesh which are designed to reflect Smith & Nephew’s industrial heritage and manufacturing history in Hull.

Production space would cover most of the ground floor of the new Melton site, with the rest featuring a foyer, warehousing and research and development laboratories. An internal and external plant would also be included at the ground floor level. The first and second floors would be made up of offices, laboratories and dining facilities.

Smith & Nephew plan to include a lake house, gym, a running track and outdoor spaces for meetings and breaks for staff in the south eastern part of the site. A small lake and pond would also be built, in part to help with drainage. Staff and visitors to the site would enter from the south of the site from Wyke Way, while HGVs would access it from the west on the same road.

The site will have 540 parking bays for staff and visitors, including 17 disabled ones and 24 electric vehicle charging points along with 80 cycling spaces. Planning documents stated the company had had meetings with local ward councillors who were broadly supportive of the plans. They added no one responded to newsletters sent to locals in September detailing the plans and asking for their views.

Documents stated: “The facility is to be a flagship building which, optimising ‘lean’ manufacturing, celebrates the company’s heritage and the world-class work undertaken in this part of the business. The Great Outdoors was one of the key principles from Smith & Nephew and the landscaping scheme has been designed to reflect this by maximising the natural assets on site.

“Smith & Nephew do not want a box in a field, they want their site to be recognisable and for it to celebrate their history and their prominence in the city.

“The relocation demonstrates Smith & Nephew are committed to investing and increasing the research and development facilities for the Advanced Wound Management sector in the region. The development will enable Smith & Nephew to increase and grow the research and development capabilities of the Advanced Wound Management, which supports highly skilled jobs.

“The development will also create more efficient and condensed manufacturing areas, whilst the scope of the production elements has changed.”