A £25 million development combining offices for 2,000 county council staff with ground floor shops is set to be built on a Stafford town centre car park.

Staffordshire County Council’s Tipping Street car park will be replaced by two large buildings of up to six storeys with a pedestrian walkway and piazza in between.

The council today announced developers Modus and Stoford Developments Ltd had been selected for the scheme.

The council will take all 150,000sq ft of office space at an annual rent of £600,000. It will provide a new administrative headquarters for the authority although the existing County Buildings in Martin Street will be retained.

There will be between 15,000 and 20,000 sq ft of retail and restaurant space on the ground level.

The shops will be between 1,000 and 5,000sq ft. The council’s deputy leader Councillor Robert Simpson said the development would be “a dynamic multi-million boost to the heart of Stafford.”

He described it as the centrepiece of the jigsaw of the regeneration of Stafford town centre and would link the historic area to the new Riverside redevelopment area.

“A drab car park is being swept away and replace with landmark buildings which will be architecturally exciting,” he added.

A planning application for the new development is set to be lodged with the borough council within a few months and the buildings would take 12 to 18 months to construct.

There will be no car parking within the development.

Councillor Simpson said that in the short term space would be available on the former Riverside Recreation centre site and in the long term a new multi-storey car park is to be developed on the Kingsmead car park site.

No name has yet been chosen for the new site and the county council may hold a competition to find a suitable name that reflects the town’s history and future.