Region remains retail hotspot, says Colliers
THE NORTH West region has brought more retail space onto the market than any other area, according to a new report by Colliers International.
The consultancy’s UK Shopping Centre Development Pipeline report showed that the region opened the greatest amount of floorspace in 2010, with Hammerson’s 620,000 sq ft The Rock scheme and the 200,000 sq ft extension to Capital & Regional’s The Mall development both being named among the top ten new developments to go live this year. In total, around 900,000 sq ft of the 2.5m sq ft of shopping centre space to come on stream has opened in the North West.
Despite this, the North West also has more shopping space in the development pipeline than any other area – 5.6m sq ft. The largest project yet to be built is Lend Lease’s 1.1m sq ft, £700m Tithebarn development in Preston, which is currently the subject of a public enquiry. A decision on its future is expected by November 24.
The report also pointed out that the region is home to the largest planning application in the UK – Peel’s £5.5bn regeneration of 60 hectares of dockland known as Liverpool Waters.
It has already secured approval for the £4.5bn, 15m sq ft Wirral Waters scheme which is set to contain 645,000 sq ft of retail space. Approval for the scheme was granted in August and the Secretary of State is currently deciding on whether or not to call in the project.
Colliers also argued that the collapse of Manchester-based Modus Ventures and of Thornfield Properties “put many town centre schemes into doubt”.
It said that although Modus’s founder, Brendan Flood, had joined forces with Scarborough Development Group’s Kevin McCabe, to buy back many of the schemes, there was little indication as to which (if any) would be progressed.
“Many of these supposed ‘saved’ schemes have seen little progress and are all but dead in the water,” it said.
The report also questioned how much extra new space was needed. It acknowledged that many existing shopping centres were of the wrong configuration to be of much use to retailers, but added that “many areas of the UK are nearing or at saturation point” in terms of the ratio between available consumer spending and the amount of retail space.
“Often the creation of new schemes simply moves spending from one location to another, rather than soaking up any previous excess demand,” the report said.
It cited Liverpool as an example where many tenants had simply moved from existing pitches into new centres, thus “shifting the prime pitch to the detriment of the former retail core rather than significantly improving the overall retail offer”.
