Leeds College of Building submits plans for CTEC training building on Melbourne Street

Leeds College of Building has submitted a planning application to Leeds City Council to convert a building on Melbourne Street, next to its North Street Campus, into a construction training facility, the college said on 6 October.

LCB bought the site in November 2025 and intends to turn it into its Construction Technical Excellence College (CTEC) building. The refurbished building will contain workshops for practical training, classrooms and amenity areas for students and staff, according to the college.

The project is out to tender for a main contractor. LCB said it expects construction to start early in 2027, with completion in time for the autumn 2028 intake.

Chris Duncan, Vice Principal of Finance & Resources at LCB, said: "This milestone is the culmination of an extensive programme of stakeholder and curriculum engagement to help design facilities to best meet national and regional skills priorities."

He said the building would provide the capacity and specialist facilities needed to develop the workforce for the government's programme of new towns, housing growth and transport infrastructure.

The design team

Fuse Studios Ltd is lead designer and architect. It is working with Turner & Townsend on project management and quantity surveying, WSP on planning, structures and MEP, LDA Design on landscape architecture and Andrew Moseley Associates on transport and development planning.

Mike Harris, Director at Fuse, said the practice had worked with the college for more than a decade, including on the South Bank Campus buildings and more recent refurbishments at North Street. He said the scheme would create teaching facilities within an existing building at a time when the industry is repurposing buildings.

Leeds Civic Trust's planning committee said in its September 2026 report that it had submitted a letter of support for the application, reference 26/04333/FU.

The size of the scheme

LCB's planning announcement and its project page describe the building as 7,000 sq m and say it will increase the size of the college estate by a quarter. The college's November 2025 acquisition announcement put the uplift at a third, and a September 2026 item on its website gave the floor area as 5,000 sq m.

The acquisition was facilitated by Holder & Co, a Horsforth-based commercial property consultancy, according to LCB. The purchase followed a £750,000 renovation of the North Street Campus, carried out over eight weeks about a year earlier.

Nikki Davis, LCB CEO and Principal, said at the time of the purchase: "This exciting acquisition will enable us to train even more construction professionals and safeguard a talent pipeline in areas such as groundwork for future construction projects across the region."

North Street is the college's original home, where it has been based since the 1960s. Its South Bank Campus opened its first building in 2015 and a second in 2019. LCB describes itself as the UK's only specialist further education college dedicated to construction and the built environment, working with more than 800 employers.

The CTEC programme

The Department for Education named the first Technical Excellence Colleges on 12 August 2025, listing Leeds College of Building as the college for Yorkshire and the Humber. LCB said it was one of only 10 colleges in England to be awarded the status.

The government said the colleges are backed by £100m and will train 40,000 construction learners by 2029. It cited Office for National Statistics figures showing about 35,000 vacancies in the sector. The colleges work on a hub and spoke model with local training providers and employers.

LCB hosted the launch of the regional CTEC network at the Royal Armouries Museum on Friday 11 September 2026, with more than 160 guests from education, construction and local government. The college and its 22 spoke college partners set out their regional delivery plans at the event.

LCB cites a Construction Industry Training Board estimate that the UK needs more than 41,000 additional construction workers a year, about 206,000 over five years. Davis said the CTEC model would help fill gaps in green skills, digitisation and modern methods of construction.

On 18 September 2026 the college announced Natalie Dodds as Director of CTEC. She joins from Rotherham College, where she was Director of Campus, and chairs the Yorkshire and Humber British Association of Construction Heads.

Construction on Melbourne Street is due to start early next year, with the building ready for students in autumn 2028.