SALFORD docks were once among the busiest in the country. The city was boosted by the construction of the Manchester Ship Canal at the end of the 19th century. But, unlike neighbouring Manchester, the docks did not bring lasting prosperity. By the 1970s, trade was in decline—and the city was, too. The canal, once the largest navigation in the world, was not big enough for modern container ships. So in 1982 Salford docks closed.

Television executives have since replaced toiling dockers. Redevelopment of the area began in the early 2000s when the Lowry, an arts centre, and a branch of the Imperial War Museum opened, both clad with striking metallic facades. Then, in 2007, the BBC chose the docks as the site for a new northern base to house departments previously located in the capital. The broadcaster, which has a commitment to be less “London-centric”, was attracted by a proposal from a consortium that included the local council and Peel Group, a property firm, which saw the broadcaster as the centre of a hub of media businesses.

The move has had plenty of critics. Some cite it as an example of the broadcaster’s profligacy: moving cost £224m ($324m). Southern celebrities complain of the distance from London (one suggested the BBC’s bosses had “lost their marbles” by setting up shop in a “not very nice part of Salford”). One-fifth of BBC staff still commute from outside the north-west; most of those who moved to the area live in Manchester (or its more salubrious suburbs) rather than Salford. Even many locals are miffed. Few work in MediaCityUK, as the hub is now branded, and those who do tend to be cleaners or security workers, says Stephen Kingston of the Salford Star, a community-run newspaper.

On a cold Friday afternoon, MediaCityUK is quiet; its gleaming buildings (which won Building Design magazine’s annual Carbuncle Cup for ugliness) stand above empty squares. BBC staff complain about the limited number of places to eat. But there are signs of improvement. The number of people employed in MediaCityUK has doubled in the past three years. “We wouldn’t have struggled in here a couple of years ago,” notes one businessman searching for a seat in a local private members’ club. And facilities are improving fast; it took 15 or 20 years for Canary Wharf, an east-London wasteland reborn as a financial-services district in the 1980s, to become a place that “wasn’t bloody awful,” says Mike Emmerich of Metro Dynamics, a consultancy with offices in London and Manchester.

The pick-up partly reflects the BBC’s success in drawing other businesses to the area. Although some had hoped the hub would be bigger by now, less than half of the 6,100 people who work in MediaCityUK are employed by the BBC. Other employers include the University of Salford, which opened a campus on the site in 2011, and ITV, Britain’s second-biggest broadcaster, which moved some of its operations there in 2013. Smaller offices contain more than 200 media, technology and marketing businesses.

The aim is to double the amount of office space in the next ten years, says Stephen Wild of MediaCityUK. The number of flats and hotel rooms is also due to grow. This will require better infrastructure. So far, the majority of investment has come from Peel Group, which has spent a total of £750m on the venture (and last year sold half its stake in MediaCityUK to Legal & General Capital, an insurance firm). Public bodies have spent a further £30m, mostly on improving transport links.

The future of MediaCityUK is still uncertain. “The fact that fewer top decision-makers came up than expected means there is a slight feeling we may be five or six bad decisions away from the BBC creeping back to London,” says Mr Emmerich. The site faces competition from local rivals, particularly Manchester’s trendy Northern Quarter, for media and technology companies. And its growth has hardly come cheap. Nevertheless, it has shown that world-class firms can get on fine outside London—and that when they move, others follow suit. In a country so dependent on its capital, that is a valuable reminder.