This weekend’s Pride may be last to have Canal Street at its centre as exodus gathers pace amid redevelopment

For decades, Canal Street has been the heart of Manchester’s Gay Village, the “c” on the sign often painted out by revellers. This weekend, as it has for the past 32 years, it will be the centre of the city’s annual Pride celebrations.

But before the 2018 event, organisers warned that next year’s Pride would look radically different. The main stage will no longer be in the car park because the land has been sold off to hotel developers. Where it goes is not yet decided, but it is all part of a move out of Canal Street by much of LGBT life, as older people settle down and the young shun a commercialised Canal Street in favour of clubbing in the old warehouses of Salford.

Manchester is undergoing its biggest transformation since the second world war. More cranes are on the horizon than in any European city, according to Joanne Roney, the council’s chief executive. With its prime city centre location, just a few minutes’ walk from Piccadilly station, it is little surprise that investors are keen to develop Canal Street and the area around it for maximum financial profit.

About 800 upmarket new flats will soon overlook Canal Street. To the north is Kampus, a 478-apartment development site that will create the city’s newest “urban waterfront destination”, according to its developers Capital & Centric and Henry Boot. At the southern end lies Manchester New Square, an imposing three-building complex that will include 351 apartments and has prompted a number of objections.

Some bar owners, a few of whom have licences to serve alcohol until 8am, believe there will be untenable conflict of interest between future residents and longstanding LGBT establishments. Noise complaints are inevitable, they fear, particularly in summer when queues can be 50-deep in the early hours. Further apartments were likely to “exacerbate the risk of such complaints which may put those businesses at risk”, objectors said.

Urban & Civic, which is developing Manchester New Square, insists it is doing the area a favour by beautifying an ugly site that had been derelict for about 20 years. The plan won unanimous approval from Manchester’s planning committee, it notes, and of the 40% of units already sold, some purchasers specifically chose flats looking out over Canal Street rather than a potentially quieter option.

“Manchester’s population is growing rapidly. Manchester city council predicts a rise of 16% by 2025, taking the population to 625,000. That’s 84,000 extra people looking for homes. These homes have to be built somewhere and this brownfield site has had consent for a scheme of this scale for many years,” said a spokeswoman.

Although most people will accept that Canal Street needed a facelift – too many of the bars have hardly changed the toilet roll since they featured in Channel 4’s drama Queer As Folk almost two decades ago – not everyone is happy with the plans for the neighbourhood.

Earlier this year, a bitter public spat took place over plans for the hotel and the surrounding area after a developer’s brochure made what it insisted was an “administrative error” (quickly rectified) of renaming the Gay Village the “Portland Street Village”. That move prompted Loz Kaye, for years the conductor of Manchester Lesbian and Gay Chorus, to say the developers’ plan “so utterly erases LGBT people from our part of the city it borders on institutional bi-, homo- and transphobia”.

This accusation was firmly rejected by the council, which stresses the Portland Street plan was for four specific plots of land adjacent to the Gay Village and not a long-term plan for it or Canal Street itself.

“We will ensure that any future investment does not displace the LGBTQ+ community,” said Bev Craig, lead member for LGBT women. The council knows how valuable the gay scene is to the economy: last year’s pPride weekend was estimated to have brought £20m to £25m in economic benefits to the city.

There’s more to gay life in Manchester than the village, said Luke Cowdrey, one half of DJ duo the Unabombers. For 20 years. he has run the club night HomoElectric, which moved out of the city centre three years ago and now operates out of Hidden and the White Hotel, two industrial spaces near Strangeways prison.

“There has been a very quiet revolution happening in Manchester. You have nights like High Hoops, Meat Free, Kiss Me Again and HomoElectric, which have all gone to what I call the ‘twilight zone’ of Manchester; into the cheap rental areas of Salford, Cheetham Hill, Antwerp Mansion in Rusholme,” he said.

“A young gay crowd, 18-year-old gay lads and girls, have no affinity with a village that [has become] a conveyor belt, a tsunami of ‘beige-ness’. There is no culture, no creativity, no warmth. So people feel comfortable, bizarrely, in going to some of the roughest areas of Manchester and Salford and Cheetham Hill.”

Mark Fletcher, the chief executive of Manchester Pride, said even he rarely socialised on Canal Street these days.

“I don’t necessarily drink in the area, though there are some great venues. It’s clear to see the migrating audiences are going further afield, looking for a more upmarket experience. They don’t mind paying £10, £12 for a cocktail or £40 for a nice meal,” he said. “The Northern Quarter is one of the most LGBT-friendly places in the city now. LGBT people no longer feel restricted to a certain area.”

He insisted Pride was not being evicted from the village, wherever the main stage ended up. “I think change is good. To be clear, we will still be delivering events in and around the Gay Village. Had we had to leave completely then I wouldn’t be giving up quite so easily. I’m excited for what the future holds.”