EXCLUSIVE: Second build to suit for Axis Works

By Liza Helps, Property Editor, Logistics Matters

FOLLOWING THE Logistics Matters exclusive that Marks & Spencer is to take a 394,680 ft2 build-to-suit at the scheme, a planning document for an application to amend a planning condition which restricts the amount of last mile parcel delivery space at the scheme, has revealed that a second reserved matters application is being prepared for the site for a B8 warehouse and distribution centre with a gross internal area of 341,635 ft2.

The occupier has yet to be revealed and while all parties have been contacted as yet no response has been given.

With regard to the application for the amendment of one of the conditions of the original  planning permission that restricted  the amount of last mile parcel delivery space wherein the news of this new build-to-suit was announced, this is currently progressing.

The  original application was for both industrial and logistics space and the specific amount of  last mile  warehouse space agreed at approx. 100,000 ft2 on that basis after a traffic assessment. However, the developers have stated: “Since marketing of the site began following the grant of the planning permission, there has been no interest from occupiers seeking to deliver B2 uses on the site, with all interest parties seeking B8 distribution floorspace.

The developers have said that this application plus the  reserved matters application for M&S means that  some 736,316 ft2 of floorspace is currently earmarked for B8 delivery against the total of approx. 2 million ft2 leaving some 1.265 million ft2 but due to the layouts of the two build-to-suit facilities, they said that it is ‘considered more realistic to assume the delivery of up to approx. 1,187 million ft2 more B8 floorspace on the remainder of the site’.

The planning document noted: “This means that the worst case assumptions made in the transport assessment, whereby trip rates were based on B2 uses, have significantly overstated the vehicular movements that will be realised through the development as it will now likely be delivered.

Technical notes prepared by PEP, the project transport consultants, set out an analysis of the difference between the assessed number of trips generated by the hypothetical B2 uses and the trips that would be generated in reality by the deliverable B8 floorspace. This figure has then been used to calculate how much parcel distribution floorspace could be delivered without exceeding the overall number of vehicular movements identified in the TA and EIA.

This analysis found that 554,341.39 ft2 of parcel distribution (of the approved total of approx. 2 million of B8 floorspace) could be delivered alongside B8 uses, if no B2 floorspace were delivered at the site.