Why Castle Meadow?
Before the opportunity to acquire the Castle Meadow site arose, the university had planned new buildings for the Business School, opening in 2026, and for our Digital Nottingham project, opening in 2024. Plans for these new buildings can now be replaced by facilities on the Castle Meadow campus, available for initial use from 2023.
The University Strategy places a special emphasis on environmental sustainability and supporting the city’s ambitions to become net zero carbon by 2028. Making use of existing buildings rather than creating new ones is a significantly more sustainable solution.
What will the site be used for?
A number of likely core uses for the new campus have already been identified:
- A new city centre location for Nottingham University Business School to conduct teaching, research and partnership activity, enabling it to grow its postgraduate offer and increase collaboration with strategic partners.
- A home for Digital Nottingham to provide an innovation hub – creating a research and knowledge exchange programme in AI, data science and FinTech in partnership with industry – that will deliver lasting benefit for the city’s economy, and potentially provide a base for some 500 researchers in these fields.
- A practice-based campus for final year and postgraduate students, creating an ecosystem of employers and students to work and learn together, ultimately preparing our students for life after university. A number of employers have already expressed interest in being housed on the campus, which would also generate significant annual rental income to re-invest in staff, students and research.