Hallé – Andrew Gourlay from David Quinn on Vimeo.

Jaguar Manchester from David Quinn on Vimeo.

Estates Gazette

13/09/200

Rare gem Developers are unlocking the potential of Manchester’s Northern Quarter. Can the area retain its unique appeal? By David Quinn

Manchester’s Northern Quarter has long been a haven for the city’s creative underbelly. The home of such mystical institutions as Afflecks Palace and the Dry Bar, the area retains an outsider status that disguises its true position, just a minute or two from the Arndale Centre.

The property industry has finally spotted the Northern Quarter’s potential. Office blocks and boutique hotels are moving in, Afflecks is now owned by Bruntwood, while consultants have highlighted the Northern Quarter’s potential to become part of a new, enlargedcity-centre retail circuit.

As development steps up a gear, the question is whether the area can retain its unique charm, and what regeneration means for its future.

The first signs of developer interest were seen when Ician, a joint venture between Muse Developments and Crosby Homes, began a £100m mixed-use scheme at Smithfield in 1999. Its fourth phase, including a 230-bedroom Crowne Plaza hotel, is due to open this month.

In general, the area has seen only sporadic activity among mainstream developers during the past decade.

“The Northern Quarter is not an area that the market has been keen to run with because of low rental values, difficult land ownerships and a lack of public realm caused by tight streets,” says Colin Williams, associate partner at planning consultancy DPP in Manchester.

The funding market has also tended to favour more familiar pastures.

Richard Heggie, head of structured property finance at Investec in Manchester, which provided funding for Brookfinch’s Margolis office development on Turner Street, says: “Most banks would tend to say they don’t understand this kind of emerging district. Funders tend to prefer what they understand, and often aren’t that innovative.”

Nonetheless, larger developers are sensing the growth potential.

Work on Argent’s Hive scheme on Lever Street has now begun after Manchester council agreed to buy the phase one freehold from the developer (see box).

The first phase includes 77,000 sq ft of naturally ventilated offices, fitted to shell, at rents of around £17.50 per sq ft. This approach, described by Argent joint chief executive David Partridge as “low-tech”, should attract creative occupiers. The Arts Council has taken a prelet of 17,000 sq ft.

Phase two

A mix of freehold office units and two hotels are proposed for phase two. Argent is in talks with hotelier Sinclair Beecham about the site.

The council’s involvement in the Hive illustrates its commitment to starting development in the Northern Quarter.

As well as the Argent investment, it has formed a jv with NCP to oversee the £55m redevelopment of the Church Street multi-storey car park. Manchester Ship Canal Developments will work up a scheme, including 65,000 sq ft of retail, 35,000 sq ft of office space, a hotel and a 745-space car park. Two buildings, including one of 13 storeys, are proposed.

Dave Roscoe, head of city-centre regeneration at the council, says the Northern Quarter has a “vital role to play” within the council’s strategic plan for the city centre.

“The creative, independent character of the Northern Quarter makes it a powerful brand, with strong potential to attract further investment and complementary activities,” he says.

The quarter has also been highlighted in a report commissioned by city-centre management company Cityco – authored by Drivers Jonas, Lunson Mitchenall and Benoy – as having the potential to become part of an enlarged city-centre retail circuit. This would see the area linked more closely with Market Street to form a pitch for “edgy, bohemian” retailers.

Nick Cole, senior planner at Drivers Jonas in Manchester, says: “The Northern Quarter could – and should – become one of Manchester’s most competitive retail investment opportunities. A fashionablenight-time economy has flourished, but specific policy interventions by the city would unlock its full potential.”

By unlocking that potential, with investment such as that already seen at the Argent scheme, concerns arise about whether the Northern Quarter’s uniqueness will be diluted, raising values and forcing the bohemian types out.

“The challenge is to develop the Northern Quarter ‘brand’,” says Williams. “As creative industries find it less affordable, the essence of what makes it attractive as a brand is brought into question.”

Argent’s Partridge acknowledges there is a fine balance to be struck.

“It’s always difficult. If everything was £5 per sq ft then the Northern Quarter would keep its edge, but you have to have progress, otherwise the whole place just falls to bits,” he says.

Meanwhile, the council seems attuned to the sensitivities of development.

“Much of the Northern Quarter is a conservation area, so developers have to demonstrate that their proposals will maintain or enhance its character,” says Roscoe. “The area has huge potential to support the growth of the city centre. But this can only be realised by reinforcing, not replacing, its distinctive identity.”

Innovative Hive deal creates a buzz

Manchester council agreed in June to buy the freehold of phase one of Argent’s Hive scheme on Lever Street in an innovative deal to help kickstart development.

In exchange for de-risking the scheme by reducing Argent’s land acquisition costs to zero, the council took a 50% profit share on the development and 5% of the rent on a long-term basis.

David Partridge, joint chief executive of Argent, says the HKR-designed scheme could not have got off the ground without the council’s assistance.

“Yields in the Northern Quarter are perhaps 1% softer than in the prime city centre,” he says. “With yields moving out by a further 1% or more in the past few months, we were looking at around 7%. In those circumstances, development wouldn’t have stacked up – so we had to offload the risk.”

The purchase price is undisclosed.

Estates Gazette

17/11/2007

Ahead of the pack Urban Splash is not going mainstream. On the contrary, the rest of the property industry is catching up. David Quinn reports.

Urban Splash has never been a classic property company. Renowned for unusual conversions andcutting-edge architecture – and setup by a man who made his name selling posters to students in Manchester’s Affleck’s Palace – the company appears outside the norm.

But Urban Splash is colliding with the mainstream. Not because of an abandonment of its principles, but because the rest of the property industry is beginning to catch up.

“I never think of Urban Splash as a maverick company,” says co-founder, chairman and erstwhile poster retailer Tom Bloxham, glugging on a Diet Coke in his minimalist Castlefield office. “The world is conspiring to come towards us. Big commercial developers are looking at what we’re doing. We’re not a maverick at the edge. We’re the direction the property industry is travelling in.”

The point is illustrated by the answer Bloxham gives when asked what characterises Urban Splash as a company. Ten years ago, his reply – “good design and architecture, a mix of uses and tenures, regeneration” – might have sounded a little left field. Today, it doesn’t.

Deputy chief executive Nick Johnson adds that “punk culture” has influenced Urban Splash’s work. “We encourage people to use their own personality to influence the decisions they make,” he says.

The environmental agenda is also a key concern, but Johnson says he has no time for “gling” – meaning “green bling”. He reasons that, if you can see a green feature such as a wind turbine on a building “it isn’t doing anything”, and professes a preference for the “unsexy stuff”, such as combined heat and power systems.

Sizeable premium

The growth of the Urban Splash brand is such that Johnson readily admits the developer can charge a sizeable premium for its product – up to 15% at Chips, its 142-unit residential scheme in New Islington, Manchester, designed by Will Alsop.

It is difficult to imagine any developer other than Urban Splash delivering a scheme called Chips, which is so named because it looks like three chips lying on their side. Bloxham, however, rejects the idea that the company has become overly associated with outlandish developments during its 14-year history.

“You can’t define a typical Urban Splash scheme,” he says. “We get sent opportunities for Victorian-mill conversions, and people say, ‘This would be ideal for Urban Splash’. But there would have to be something really special about it for us to do something like that today.”

Instead, the developer has recently turned its attention to unloved concrete tower blocks, the product of outdated “cities in the sky” slum-clearance programmes of the 1960s.

How can Urban Splash create demand for this type of living accommodation when history seems to show that nobody wants it?

Bloxham believes a re-evaluation of such buildings is necessary.

“The reason these things failed is because of a lack of maintenance and poor management, rather than intrinsic problems with the buildings themselves,” he says.

Bloxham also believes it is “incredibly wasteful to knock down a building”, and would rather use what is there.

This preference for recycling was followed at Chimney Pot Park in Salford where, instead of demolishing the terraced houses on the site, Urban Splash elected to turn them “upside-down” by creating anopen-plan living space on the first floor, backing on to a raised outdoor space.

Despite its ingenuity, the English Partnerships-backed scheme is arguably Urban Splash’s only brush with bad publicity, after complaints from locals that they could not afford the £99,500 finished product.

“The issue revolved around a statement about homes for £50,000, which was made five years ago and got into the press,” says Johnson. “The market has obviously moved on since then. If we were to sell at that price, it would have required much more public funding.”

Grant funding

Within the property industry, those who do not know much about the company all say one thing: that, as in Salford, Urban Splash has a mastery of the process needed to secure grant funding. Bloxham says that while this could be true of some of its schemes, many others required no contribution from the public purse.

“In Manchester, there’s no public funding needed anymore in the city centre. All our recent schemes in Liverpool are happening without funding, whereas 15 years ago, when no one else was doing anything in the Ropewalks area, it was needed,” he says.

As the mainstream collides with Urban Splash’s way of thinking, some have ventured to suggest the company could make a compelling purchase for one of the giants of the industry. But Bloxham, who owns 70.9% of Urban Splash, shrugs the idea off.

“I love doing what I do – taking blighted, ugly sites and creating objects of beauty,” he says. “If I did sell out, I’d probably put all my money into property, so there wouldn’t be much point.”

For now, Bloxham’s empire looks set to keep on growing. The rest of the property industry may be on Urban Splash’s tail, but he is keen to keep ahead of the pack.

[Box]

Splashing across the Mersey

Urban Splash is undertaking 12 projects in Liverpool from its offices on Fleet Street in the city centre.

Its biggest scheme in the city is the Great George Street development, where 700 homes are planned in what Bill Maynard, head of the firm’s Liverpool office, describes as “five big phases”.

It is a far cry from Urban Splash’s beginnings in the city. Maynard, a former Liverpool council planner, confesses that he “laughed” when Urban Splash founder Tom Bloxham purchased the Palace complex on Slater Street with proposals to turn it into “the Covent Garden of the north”.

But when Bloxham linked up with Urban Splash’s other co-founder, Jonathan Falkingham, to purchase several more buildings in the Concert Square area, Maynard became convinced of the growth potential and came on board.

The company is working up £60m plans for the conversion of the Littlewoods building off Edge Lane into 250 flats, a hotel and commercial space.

It was also recently selected to transform the disused ABC cinema on Lime Street into a hotel and restaurant.

“Lime Street is an interesting part of town,” says Maynard. “The local authority and English Partnerships are keen to see something happen because it’s the gateway intothe city.”

Other schemes in Liverpool include the Matchworks office scheme in Speke and the conversion of St Peter’s Church on Duke Street into the footballers’ wives-favoured Alma de Cuba bar.

[BOX]

New Islington: ‘Poundbury on acid’

Perhaps Urban Splash’s most significant scheme, and the one that has defined its ethos, is New Islington in east Manchester, where the company was selected as lead developer in 2000.

New Islington is designed to be mixed-use, sustainable and architecturally innovative. Once completed, it will include 1,700 homes, retail and leisure facilities, 1m sq ft of public open space and a raft of community facilities, including a school.

The company’s deputy chief executive Nick Johnson describes New Islington as “tradition with a twist”, and emphasises its credentials as a sustainable community.

“The constituent parts are parks, canals, a surgery, a primary school, a row of shops – there’s nothing new in that,” he says.

Perhaps surprisingly, Johnson compares Islington with the Prince Charles-backed and critically panned Poundbury development in Dorset.

“It’s Poundbury on acid,” he says, half-jokingly. “The essence of a sustainable community is the same the world over. We all have human needs that need to be satisfied. But we give it a devilish twist. We add a bit of adventure.”

Estates Gazette

6/10/2007

Manchester council chief Sir Howard Bernstein is leading a final campaign to convince Gordon Brown that a super-casino is the only way to revive a rundown area of the city. David Quinn reports

After a run of bad luck, Manchester’s hopes of becoming home to the UK’s first super-casino looked dead and buried this summer. Not so, say the city’s council leaders, who are this week launching a fight to secure the £250m entertainment scheme which they believe can – and must – be delivered.

It was in January that the independent Casino Advisory Panel surprised almost everyone by recommending Manchester over favourites Blackpool and the Millennium Dome in east London as the location for the UK’s sole super-casino. But since then, odds against its delivery have lengthened so much that the media have all but written off the development.

Key factors in the super-casino’s downfall were its rejection in the Lords in March (see panel, p87) and, crucially, the apparent antipathy of new prime minister Gordon Brown. When, after finally getting the keys to number 10, the Presbyterian Brown called for a review of the use of super-casinos as a means of delivering regeneration it was seen as the death knell for the initiative. In fact, what Brown had actually said on 11 July was that the project would be “subject to reflection”.

Media commentators suggest that the prime minister is keen to wash his hands of the super-casino because it plays badly in Daily Mail-reading Middle England, which Brown’s strategists are desperate to woo ahead of a possible late-autumn election.

But, with little fanfare, Brown instigated the inter-departmental review he promised. Manchester is a “constructive participant” in the review, which is led by the Department of Communities and Local Government and is expected to declare its findings within weeks. Brown is not expected to make a final decision until after an election, however, for fear of the political fallout.

For Sir Howard Bernstein, chief executive of Manchester city council, the fact that the review is happening at all is evidence that the government has an open mind about the future of the scheme. “There was speculation in the press about what was on the prime minister’s mind [following the July statement] but it’s clear that he wants a period of time to reflect,” says Bernstein.

“There’s no alternative”

The council’s contribution is a renewed drive to claw back the scheme it views as a hard-won prize. Bernstein rejects any suggestion that it should forget the super-casino and put its energies into alternative uses for the site it had prepared for the scheme at Sportcity in east Manchester.

“Manchester remains committed to supporting this scheme, and we’ll work hard with the government to make sure it’s delivered,” says Bernstein.

“Our submission is that there is no alternative strategy and there is no type of development, other than a super-casino, which can deliver the same level of benefit.”
To make its case, the council submitted a dossier, compiled by KPMG, listing a series of possible alternative uses for the cleared Sportcity site – all of which the dossier then pulls apart.

Casino-free leisure schemes are said to be “uneconomic”. Residential development is described as “antithetical to the role and function of the site”. Offices are “not sustainable without very significant public funding support”, while speculative development is described as “not realistic”. But the super-casino-led scheme meets with favour and is described as “wholly consistent with spatial and regeneration strategies”.

According to the dossier: “It is unlikely that there is any alternative use which can achieve the [regeneration] outcomes in east Manchester with no public subsidy, and generate a positive return for further regeneration.”

While this line of argument is open to question by the government in the battle ahead, the need for regeneration in east Manchester is undisputed. The council points out that around 33,000 jobs were lost in the area during the 1970s and 1980s and that more than 90% of the area’s 62,000 residents live in neighbourhoods ranked in England’s worst 10%.

The creation of a 675,000 sq ft mixed-use scheme anchored by a 53,800 sq ft super-casino would form the next phase in the area’s regeneration, creating 3,500 jobs, injecting £250m of capital investment and attracting 1.3m visitors pa, according to the council.

However, questions have been raised from across the political spectrum about whether a giant casino with unlimited-jackpot slot machines is really what this deprived area needs. Pressure groups such as Campaign Against Super-Casino Expansion claim super-casinos create “problem gambling” and will do little to benefit deprived communities. The Archbishop of Canterbury has also voiced concerns about “the sleight of hand by which the whole business of the gambling industry has become coupled with the regeneration theme”.

Bernstein dismisses such concerns, saying a super-casino would not be harmful to the area’s residents. “We are dealing with a casino that will become part of the most regulated section of gambling in the UK,” he says. “The evidence doesn’t support people’s opposition to casinos. These facilities, if done right, can be centres for economic growth.”

Bernstein refers to the recent British Gambling Prevalence Survey 2007, conducted on behalf of the Gambling Commission by the independent National Centre for Social Research. Its key finding was that rates of problem gambling in the UK have not risen since 1999 and remain at 0.6% of the population.

He says this is “surprising” given the massive growth in the multi-million-pound online gambling industry during this period and believes it is therefore unlikely that a single super-casino in Manchester will have any significant effect on problem gambling.

Moreover, Bernstein warns that if the super-casino is not delivered, initiatives promoting responsible gambling will be set back. The council has pledged that section 106 agreements will stipulate that the successful super-casino developer must help fund gambling support groups and other such projects.

Bernstein is clearly up for a fight. “It’s going to be an entertaining process,” he chuckles. “The evidence in our favour is clear but public confidence has to be built up.”


How super-casino ball got rolling

2003 Manchester council opens competition for cleared 18.6-acre site next to City of Manchester stadium at Sportcity

2004 Kerzner International and Ask Developments selected to deliver mixed-use scheme anchored by a super-casino. Subsequently, the Gambling Act says the super-casino should be awarded by public tender, meaning Kerzner/Ask will have to re-bid in competition with other operators

2005 Gambling Act made law. One super-casino with a minimum gaming area of 53,800 sq ft will be built, alongside eight “large” and eight “small” casinos

2006 Casino Advisory Panel considers eight shortlisted locations. Blackpool and the Millennium Dome emerge as favourites

30 January 2007 CAP picks Manchester for the super-casino

28 March House of Lords rejects – by three votes – an order backing CAP’s decision to award Manchester the super-casino

11 July Prime minister Gordon Brown announces review, prompting speculation that the project is dead

6 October Manchester launches fightback as conclusion of review draws near

The Times
June 12, 2007

BYLINE: David Quinn

WHILE its name suggests a company devoted to the UK’s capital city, Allied London’s top achievement to date has been in Manchester.

Since joining Allied London in 1995, Mike Ingall, the chief executive, has been the architect of the company’s rebirth, culminating in Spinningfields. He took a publicly quoted South-eastern investor in offices and sheds and repositioned it as a private leader of northern urban regeneration.

Spinningfields is the biggest example of Allied London’s core strategy -to buy secondary, partially vacant properties, to expand surrounding ownerships and to create a masterplan for redevelopment before selling. It took a similar approach at the Brunswick in Bloomsbury, Central London, as well as the office-led Skypark scheme in Glasgow, which it sold for £ 90 million in 2005.

Ingall says: “These schemes are created out of buying existing assets yielding 6-9 per cent. Development takes time but is less risky because, while we are creating a masterplan, we are working the existing asset and creating value that can be realised should the final scheme not come to fruition.”

Prior to 2000, he oversaw Allied London’s purchase of a series of retail centres around the country, in ostensibly unglamorous towns such as St Albans, Carlisle and Burgess Hill.

“We bought, refurbished, repositioned about 12 retail centres, converted them to mixed use with leisure and restaurants, and sold them back to the institutional market.”

The company, which delisted in 2000 and has just 26 full-time staff, is owned 20 per cent by its management, 40 per cent by Royal Bank of Scotland and 40 per cent by Jamie Ritblat’s Delancey, after a £ 500 million management buyout last year.

Although Ingall does not rule out further investment in the North if the deal is right, he sees London as the bedrock for the company’s growth. It also owns Pelham Homes, which has options on 3,000 acres in Sussex, Kent and Essex.

Copyright 2007 Times Newspapers Limited
All Rights Reserved

The Times
June 12, 2007

BYLINE: David Quinn

David Quinn reports on Manchester’s Spinningfields development

THE regeneration of Manchester after the bombing of the city centre in
1996 is usually associated with the creation of new shops. While it is
true that shoppers have flocked to Selfridges and Harvey Nichols since
then, office workers have also found something bold and luxurious to
settle into.

Spinningfields has become Manchester’s first choice among businesses
seeking somewhere smart. The development is also becoming a focus for
retailer and restaurant activity itself -Armani, Hugo Boss and
Carluccio’s have recently signed for space and 400 apartments have been
built.

Allied London Properties identified the site between Deansgate and the
River Irwell in 1997 and began to buy its 9 hectares (23 acres). Mike
Ingall, chief executive, says the aim was to provide something
different. “We realised the potential to expand Manchester’s traditional
office core was restricted by small buildings and a semi-medieval street
pattern.

“We decided to provide something new, with floorplates of more than
1,860 sq m (20,000 sq ft).” Manchester City Council bought into the
idea, realising Spinningfields could help to attract new inward
investment. A masterplan of large-scale buildings around open public
squares was made. But not everyone was enthusiastic. Commercial property
agents could not see the big picture. Ingall says: “Only one agent
backed us. Most thought I was from a different planet. We were taking
the central business district to the western side of Deansgate, which
was seen as a taboo.”

Bob Dyson, then at Dunlop Heywood and now North West chairman of Jones
Lang LaSalle, was that agent. Dyson says: “Nobody thought there was the
demand from occupiers to support the development but that made Mike more
determined. I shared his view that we could create an environment where
people wanted to be.”

Since then, it is difficult to overstate the impact Spinningfields has
had on Manchester’s commercial property market. The development, where
3.5 million sq ft is planned, secured almost 30 per cent of the 2006
800,000 sq ft city-centre office take-up, says WHR, a Manchester
property consultant.

Copyright 2007 Times Newspapers Limited
All Rights Reserved

The office of Peel Holdings, one of the UK’s largest landlords and property developers, is perched in what a helpful assistant calls “Peel Dome”, high above the consumerist temple that is the Trafford Centre.

Once inside, there is a conspicuous lack of mahogany panelling, shag pile carpet and the other various trappings associated with mega-landowners of the sort Peel undoubtedly is. Lest we forget, this is a company with assets totalling £2.5bn, whose majority shareholder, John Whittaker, is thought to be worth £929m, which puts him at number seven on this year’s EG Rich List.

On entering one of several boardrooms, one is confronted with a couple of huge maps illustrating Peel’s landholdings. On one side, a plan shows that the company owns virtually everything along the Manchester Ship Canal.

It is undoubtedly a lot of land, and that’s only a small portion of it. The company owns 20,000 acres of land and 5m sq ft of investment property across the UK and in Bermuda, the Bahamas and Spain.

The famous purchase

“It’s been built up with acquisitions over the past 20 years,” explains director Ed Burrows, who has been with the company for the past 17 years.

“We do buy and sell land, but large acreages have been acquired by purchasing other companies.”

The most famous of these purchases was Peel’s acquisition of the Manchester Ship Canal Company in 1987.

But the firm hasn’t just sat on its landholding, having invested over £300m in the Ship Canal and its environs during the past 12 years. Add to that the £350m the firm has thrown at the Trafford Centre and a further £300m invested by the centre’s occupiers themselves, and you have a total of well over £1bn invested in the Ship Canal Corridor, all spurred by Peel.

The company has further plans for the corridor in the shape of Port Salford, a proposed multimodal freight terminal on a 200-acre brownfield site close to Barton Airfield in Irlam. Salford council is considering the proposals.

At the eastern end of the Ship Canal sits Salford Quays, where Peel owns most of the remaining development land. The company’s latest plan for the area is the 15-acre Quays Point. Peel already has planning permission for a 1m sq ft office and residential development on the site, which is opposite the Imperial War Museum North. It plans a “Third Grace” landmark building to complement the Daniel Libeskind-designed Museum, and the Lowry.

“Salford Quays has a parallel with London Docklands,” says Burrows.

“It has a similar relationship to Manchester city centre as Docklands has to the City of London: similar facilities, and Metrolink tying it to the city.”

The other major site at Salford Quays is known as Pomona and is a 26-acre plot at the eastern end of the quays. Peel has submitted an application to develop 500 flats. It will not build these itself.

As with Quays Point, once Peel has obtained planning permission, it will sell to a residential developer. Crosby Homes, City Lofts and Millennium have recently bought large plots from Peel in this way, and are at various stages of development. At the moment, Peel has no plan to cut out the middle man and go into residential development itself.

“Peel doesn’t build houses,” says Burrows. “That’s a specialist market. Our policy is to maximise planning permission on a site, then sell it on.”

But Peel is a sophisticated landowner, having realised the potential of a long-term approach. It has donated £12m, plus a significant landholding, to the Imperial War Museum North, as well as in excess of £5m of land to the Metrolink tram system. These may seem generous acts, but the fact that these two projects have led to a huge increase in visitors to the area, as well as improved national and international perceptions of Salford Quays, has caused a huge growth in land values.

The long-term view

Perhaps Peel’s commitment to the long haul was behind Whittaker’s decision to take the company private in August. Although Burrows prefers not to speculate on the reasons, he does say: “The company has always had a long-term view.”

Whittaker is said to be a very “hands on” chairman who takes a strong interest in the day-to-day affairs of the business. He has four children, three of whom work for the firm. The other is expected to join after graduating from university. The eldest is Mark, who has been with Peel for 10 years. He is in charge of the Peel Investments wing of the business, which holds and trades a mixed portfolio of property across the country, and has an annual rental income of £40m.

He is responsible for letting Venus, the 91,500 sq ft office building the firm has developed in an area it is calling Trafford Quays, opposite the Trafford Centre. Half of the building was let earlier this year to medical supplies company SSL International.

“We see Trafford Quays as a new business location. We’re trying to create a mixture of uses between offices and leisure, and that’s why we developed Venus,” says Whittaker.

“The strength of the location lies in the fact that we have secured a 45,000 sq ft letting within three months of practical completion. We want to continue to strengthen Trafford Quays in response to market demand.”

At present, much of the land around Trafford Quays does not have the relevant planning permission to permit Peel to embark on this project, but the firm is hopeful it won’t be long in coming.

Peel also recently launched Peel Business Parks. Around 2,000 acres of land have been siphoned off into this venture, much of it located near the four airports the company owns in Liverpool, Teesside, Sheffield and at the former RAF Finningley, also known as Robin Hood Doncaster Sheffield Airport. However, there are 20 different sites in total, in areas as diverse as Wakefield, Ellesmere Port and the M3 corridor.

Matthew Fitton, property development manager, who is tasked with developing the business parks, says: “It’s a case of pulling everything together under one brand. We’re currently working to label everything up over the next 18 months.”

Fitton says Salford Quays has been excluded from the Peel Business Parks exercise, although Port Salford, if given the go-ahead, will fall under the new umbrella.

[BOX]
The Peel Empire

Land and property Includes Peel Investments and Peel Business Parks. Schemes include Salford Forest Park, a £100m scheme on the drawing board, which could see horse racing return to Manchester. Also includes land at Salford Quays, the 1.4m sq ft Trafford Centre, Trafford Quays, Port Salford and Gloucester Quays

Peel Ports Includes the Manchester Ship Canal, Clydeport (Scotland’s only Atlantic-facing port), and the Glasgow Harbour Development

Peel Airports Liverpool John Lennon airport, Teeside International airport, Sheffield City airport and Robin Hood Doncaster International airport at the former RAF Finningley airbase

Total holdings 5m sq ft of investment property and 20,000 acres of land worth £2.5bn