ITV staying put in Manchester

ITV will keep its Manchester based studios, where Coronation Street is filmed, instead of moving to a new site with the BBC.

For months now there’s been much speculation that the home of Corrie, and ITV in Manchester, could move as the broadcaster considered moving in with the BBC at the newly built Media Village.

ITV felt the relocation would allow them to cut costs and update the sets for Coronation Street to allow filming in HD to begin. However, today it was announced that ITV and Coronation Street would not move after all.

“Negotiations with the Peel Group over the possible move of ITV’s Manchester operation to MediaCity in Salford were terminated by ITV this week after the developer dramatically scaled back its financial commitment to the ITV element of the project. As a result we will remain at our Quay Street base for the foreseeable future.” – ITV statement.

ITV will now remain at Quay Street but will be joined there by Countdown, which is produced for Channel 4, which is moving to Manchester from Leeds due to scaling back at the ITV Yorkshire site.

The Quay Street studios of ITV were built for Granada Television, opening in 1956. They were the first purpose built television studios in the UK, beating TV Centre from the BBC by a couple of years. Other shows produced currently at the Manchester base include The Jeremy Kyle Show. The centre has also been home to many popular productions over the past five decades including Stars in their Eyes, A Family at War and Nearest and Dearest.