Bristol University: Opening of £300m campus delayed until 2025

The university hopes construction work will begin on the main academic building on Cattle Marker Road in summer 2022

A £300m campus for the University of Bristol has been delayed again and is now expected to open in 2025.

The university said "uncertainties" caused by Brexit and the pandemic meant the scheme needed to be pushed back.

It is the second time the date has been revised after initial plans to open in 2022 were delayed by a year.

A digital innovation centre, business school and a student residential village are all part of the development near Temple Meads station.

Tower blocks containing student flats and a digital innovation centre are among the buildings included in the sprawling campus

Almost 1,000 students will be housed in three tower blocks of flats which were approved in 2019 despite criticism from some councillors who labelled them "ugly" and "monolithic".

The university said some preparatory work had taken place on the Temple Quarter Enterprise Campus programme but the main construction on the Cattle Market Road site would not begin until the summer of 2022.

It is now expected the campus will open in the second half of 2025.

A derelict former Royal Mail sorting office and adjoining 1970s office building was demolished in 2019 to make way for the new campus.

Student flats next to Bristol Temple Meads were approved in 2019 and include a gym, roof garden and picnic area

Barra Mac Ruairí, the university's chief property officer, said the delay was "disappointing" but it remained committed to the "very challenging" development.

He said it was "probably the largest investment the university has made in over a century" and "has to be right and has to be of quality".

Mr Mac Ruairí added: "It's always frustrating to have a delay. But the site is a complex one.

"It was derelict because of a lot of the challenges of making sure that [a project] is viable and capable of being delivered."

Changes to the plans made over recent months include replacing lecture theatres with more teaching space, he said.

The former Royal Mail sorting office was demolished two years ago