Twenty twenty-five is set to be a big year for Stoke-on-Trent. The year will see the 100th anniversary of Stoke-on-Trent being granted city status, while a number of the city council's major capital projects are due to be completed.

Here is a list of some of the things Stoke-on-Trent residents can expect from the council over the next 12 months.

Stoke-on-Trent's Centenary

There will be a range of events to celebrate the 100th anniversary of Stoke-on-Trent becoming a city (LDRS).

George V officially conferred city status on the borough of Stoke-on-Trent in 1925. A programme of events is being planned throughout 2025 to mark the 100th anniversary of Stoke-on-Trent becoming a city. They will include a number of music concerts, such as The Rise of the Fab Four at the King's Hall on January 25, and the Big Sing and Big Play , featuring primary and secondary school pupils from across the city, at the Victoria Hall in June.

The city council has also announced that Gladstone Pottery Museum, which is normally closed over the winter until March, will re-open on January 2. In addition the city's centenary, 2025 also marks 50 years since Gladstone opened as a museum.

Veteran city councillor Ross Irving, who was first elected in 1973, has been appointed as the Honorary Custodian of the Federation and will play a key role throughout the centenary year. And local poet Nick Degg, known for works such as 'I Come From a Town', will serve as Stoke-on-Trent Poet Laureate in 2025.

For more information about the centenary celebrations, visit sot100.org.uk

The Goods Yard

The first phase of Goods Yard, in Stoke, is due to be completed this year (LDRS).

Spring 2025 will see the completion of the first phase of the Goods Yard, the first of Stoke-on-Trent's major levelling up projects to be delivered.

Stoke-on-Trent City Council has been working with developer Capital&Centric on the £60 million 'urban village', which will provide 174 flats and 30,000 sq ft of commercial space on the former site of Swift House, next to Stoke Station and the Trent and Mersey Canal. Along with the new build block of flats which now towers over the station area, the scheme also features the restored Vaults Warehouse, which will provide food and drink outlets with canalside seating.

The project was allocated £16 million of government funding, and unlike other levelling up schemes such as Etruscan Square in Hanley it has remained more or less on schedule. However, the Goods Yard has not entirely escaped controversy – in November council leaders agreed to provide the project with an extra £4 million of taxpayers' cash to cover 'abnormal costs'.

In addition to the completion of the Goods Yard, the council will be expected to make progress on its other levelling up schemes in 2025, such as Etruscan Square and the Spode redevelopment in Stoke.

Stoke Station

The council predicts work around College Road will be completed in spring 2025 (Nub News).

Just a stone's throw from the Goods Yard, another of the city council's major capital projects is due to finally come to fruition in 2025. In 2020 the council was awarded £29 million from the government's Transforming Cities fund, to pay for a raft of schemes aimed at improving public transport in Stoke-on-Trent.

The biggest of these projects has involved major changes to the area around Stoke Station, including the introduction of bus gates on College Road and Winton Square, new bus stops and the removal of parking spaces.

All these changes are intended to improve the bus link to the city centre while also making the area a more pleasant environment for pedestrians travelling to and from the station. Station Road has previously been notorious for rush hour gridlock, and it has long been felt that the station should be a more welcoming gateway to Stoke-on-Trent, particularly for newcomers to the city.

Since May, the Transforming Cities works have seen a number of road closures and temporary changes to parking, bus stops and the taxi rank. The council expects the College Road works will be completed by spring 2025, while the Station Road works should be finished by the autumn.

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