Berkeley Group developer St James has secured a resolution to grant planning permission from the London Borough of Hammersmith & Fulham for its vast 1,465-home White City scheme in West London. 

The 10-acre Marks & Spencer warehouse site will be transformed into a residential neighbourhood set in a new 4 acre public park known as White City Green.

This open space will be fully funded by St James and provide opportunities for a range of leisure and recreational activities and events.

The whole development aims to deliver new homes, along with commercial, office, community and leisure space. It will bring £615m of investment, create 620 jobs in construction, and deliver just over 30% affordable housing on and off site.

A new bridge and pedestrian deck across London Underground’s Central Line will give direct access to the Westfield London shopping centre to the south.

The Marks and Spencer warehouse is due to be vacated in July 2016 and construction is planned to start at the earliest opportunity.

St James will deliver the scheme in several phases over a 15-year period.

Great Portland Estates is planning to start six more major London projects as developers in the capital scramble to meet demand for new space.

With six major projects on the go already, the developer now boasts the largest development pipeline in its history.

Announcing strong annual growth today, GPE said its substantial pipeline of opportunities included an additional 18 uncommitted projects, including six schemes totalling 548,600 sq ft with potential starts in the next 24 months.

Spending will rise from £325m on the half-dozen projects already committed to or in construction to £533m if the next six go ahead.

Toby Courtauld, chief executive, said: “Our 1.2m sq ft committed and near-term development programme is the largest we have ever undertaken and accounts for around 25% of all core West End speculative deliveries over the next four years.

“It contains some exceptional schemes, including a major contribution towards the regeneration of the east end of Oxford Street.

“In addition, our long, flexible pipeline of future projects contains many enticing prospects, often near to Crossrail stations, stretching well into the next decade.”

In total, GPE’s 2.5m sq ft development programme covers over half of the existing portfolio and upcoming deliveries in the core West End represent around 25% of this sub-market’s total forecast speculative supply over the next four years.

GPE said it expected to see a pick-up in the speculative development pipeline as developers respond to stronger occupier demand levels and the prospect of rental growth.

But it predicted many of these West End schemes would face significant barriers with the lead time between development starts and completions expected to take several years.

“These barriers increasingly include a shortage of contractor capacity which is both reducing market access to new entrants or those developers without meaningful pipelines of work and supporting construction cost inflation.

“While construction costs are rising from a relatively low base, the major cost consultants are forecasting annual cost inflation of 4-7% over the coming years for commercial schemes,” said Courtald.

“Across our business, we expect to be able to largely mitigate these cost increases and capacity constraints through rental growth, our deep relationships with contractors, effective supply chain management and our pipeline of opportunities.”

Wates Construction has landed a £76m apartment scheme at Greenwich Peninsula for developer Knight Dragon.

The building, designed by architects Pilbrow & Partners, is the firm’s largest build on the vast residential scheme to date, after winning two previous residential projects.

The latest job will comprise a 32-storey tower with a seven-storey podium at its base containing 269 private and affordable social apartments. It is due for completion in spring 2017.

Located on plot 104, the new apartments form part of phase two of a major programme of works to deliver 10,000 new residential units on the Greenwich Peninsula – one of the largest regeneration schemes in Europe.

Wates previously won contracts for 201 flats on plot 114, after Willmott Dixon dropped out as lead contractor, and 144 flats on plot 115

The builder also completed a new marketing hub for the large site last year

Mark Tant, managing director, Wates Construction, London Residential, said: “This contract marks another milestone reached in this ambitious regeneration scheme and demonstrates our ability to deliver large-scale high-rise residential projects that add to the changing landscape of the capital.”

Richard Margree, Chief Executive of Knight Dragon, added: “This is a vital site for London to provide homes for people who want to live and work in the capital.

“Knight Dragon has invested £500m so far and is committed to delivering a vibrant and viable development.  We already have 1,300 homes under construction, with 500 to be completed in the next few months.”

Developer Rocket Investments has awarded Mace the contract to build a landmark residential tower near Old Street roundabout in London.

Demolition contractor John F Hunt is clearing the existing brick building at 145 City Road to make way for the 40-storey apartment block, which will be known as the Atlas Building.

Mace is expected to start construction in July on the main resi block and adjacent 10-floor office building.

The project also contains a new public piazza and retail space for shops, cafes and restaurants and is due for completion at the end of 2018.

The concept design, which will accommodate 300 flats, was drawn up by architect Make, with Scott Brownrigg now acting as delivery architect.

Make’s striking design takes the form of a wafer of a dozen blades breaking up the tower’s mottled white facade.

Planned Atlas Building at 145 City Road

URS are structural engineers and GVA London Wall, the project managers.

It will be the sixth major high-rise residential building planned or under construction on City Road, which is undergoing a mini construction boom around the newly-dubbed Silicon Roundabout district.

Work is also shortly to get underway on a twin-tower scheme at 250 City Road for Berkeley Homes, which is construction managing the project and its the tallest high-rise the developer has delivered direct, preferring to use Brookfield Multiplex on its tallest buildings.

The Foster & Partners designed scheme comprises a 42-storey tower block and a 36-storey tower block. Demolition has been completed and main concrete package will be delivered by Laing O’Rourke’ Expanded business.

Berkeley Home’s twin tower resi scheme at 250 City Road

Greater London average prices:

– £594,585

– +2.5% monthly change

– +6.8% annual change

Best performers

– Tower Hamlets

– Westminster

– Kensington & Chelsea

– Southwark

– Bromley

Link to full report: http://www.rightmove.co.uk/news/files/2015/04/april-2015.pdf

Japan’s leading developer Mitsubishi Estate is to submit a planning application for a 40-storey office tower at the heart of the City of London.

The proposals for an office-led, mixed-use tower with public viewing gallery at the top have been designed by Wilkinson Eyre Architects and resembles a stack of blocks.

The redevelopment of 6-8 Bishopsgate and 150 Leadenhall Street is rated as one of the most prized sites in the Square Mile nestled between the Cheesegrater and soon to be redeveloped site of the stalled Pinnacle building.

The London arm of Mitsubishi Estate is seeking to bring forward the comprehensive regeneration of the site.

Stanhope is the development manager  on the scheme, Arup is the structural and services engineer and Alinea is the cost consultant. Gerald Eve is advising on planning.

The 770,000 sq ft  building will comprises a series of five rotated building blocks. The higher up the tower, the narrower these volumes become, reducing in size to produce a slender tower form.

It has been conceived to be an exemplar in urban office design and will include some of the highest sustainability and low energy features. The scheme will exceed the threshold for the BREEAM NC 2014 “Excellent” rating.

Mr Naoki Umeda, managing director and CEO of Mitsubishi Estate London said: “The submission of this application represents Mitsubishi Estate’s confidence in  the City of London’s long term growth prospects as a world financial centre, and its attractiveness for blue chip companies.

“We look forward to enhancing the offer of the City further by delivering a striking landmark building on this fantastic location, which bridges London’s financial and insurance districts”.

Outline planning permission has been granted for the £3.5bn Silvertown Quay project on land neighbouring the Royal Docks in East London.

The 62 acre Royal Docks site will provide offices, leisure and retail facilities and 3,000 homes including affordable housing.

Chelsfield, alongside partners Imagination Europe and First Base are planning more than 3m sq ft of mixed-use space on the 50-acre docklands site owned by Government.

The first phase, which aims to be finished by 2018 in time for the new Crossrail connections, will see the iconic 450,000 sq ft Millennium Mills site converted into a hub for technology, media and telecoms businesses.

Work began earlier this year to strip out asbestos from the former flour mill as part of a £12m grant by the Department for Communities and Local Government.

At the core of the new London Quarter will be a series of branded pavilions to showcase and exhibit products from leading global brands.

The developers claim the re-enlivened dock will be the world’s first cluster of purpose-built centres for product innovation.

As part of the Section 106 legal agreement, the developer would provide £10m to Workplace, Newham Council’s job brokerage scheme, this would be used to provide training  and support for Newham residents to ensure they have the skills needed to take advantage of the 20,700 new jobs the development is expected to generate.

It is also hoped the development will create 20,700 jobs over the next 10 years.

The application will now be referred to the Mayor of London and then to the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government and Secretary of State for Transport before a final decision can be issued.

Kier has been selected to build the £170m first phase of The Ram Quarter, a major flagship regeneration scheme in Wandsworth, London.

The deal will put Kier is a strong position to ultimately build all three phases of the Ram Quarter with a total value of around £600m.

Kier will deliver 338 of the 661 new homes planned for the site in a 36-storey tower as part of the scheme, which will be its first high-rise job in London.

The first phase of the project also includes the 56,000sq ft refurbishment and remodelling of the Grade II listed brewery complex, creating restaurants, boutique shops, cafés and bars, a micro-brewery, a brewery museum and residential units.

Kier will start enabling works this month with phase one scheduled for completion in early 2017.

Haydn Mursell, chief executive, said: “Kier has extensive experience in major mixed-use and regeneration projects in London and our breadth and depth of experience has positioned us to become a partner of choice for major city regeneration schemes.”

Willmott Dixon has landed a £14m deal to build a new Dorsett City hotel on the former site of The Matrix building in Aldgate.

It is the contractor’s first project for Dorsett Hospitality International, which operates 22 hotels around the world.

This will be Dorsett’s second hotel in London and Willmott Dixon will start on site next month to build the 13 storey complex next to Aldgate tube station and the 18th century St Botolph Church.

Demolition specialist Squibb Group has cleared the site for main construction.

When complete in December 2016 the hotel will provide 270 bedrooms along with a restaurant, fitness centre and 1,600 sq ft of meeting areas for the business community.

Roger Forsdyke, managing director at Willmott Dixon’s Cobham office said, “This is a really interesting office to hotel conversion right in the heart of The City of London, providing new capacity in this fast growing part of London.

“Importantly, it plays to our strengths and know-how of working on tight, constrained sites in urban locations, as well as our record for working in historic parts of London on landmark buildings.”

Kier has gained reserved matters planning consent for its latest mixed-use project at the King’s Cross Goods Yard site in London.

Badged R7 by developer Argent, the 150,000 sq ft will rise to 13 storeys in a west tower of offices above a cinema and shops, while the East tower will hold 11 storeys of offices above retail space at ground level.

Located to the north of the Regents Canal opposite the Grade II listed Granary Building and Central St Martins school of art, the scheme is worth around £60m.

By using a combination of complimentary passive and active design features to obtain very low carbon omissions the ‘bespoke’ BREEAM pre-assessment predicts that the building is on target to achieve an ‘Outstanding’ rating.

Work on R7 will start immediately; completion is due in 2017.

Kier is also due to build an adjacent building known as R8, a 200,000 sq ft scheme involving a mix of private and affordable housing.