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Location Between Dartford and Gravesend in north Kent Description Ebbsfleet Valley, which includes Ebbsfleet and the former Blue Circle-owned Easter Quarry, will be a mixed-use development totalling 1,140 acres with around 10,000 homes, 6m sq ft of office space and 3m sq ft of shops, leisure and community facilities Jurisdiction The project has been divided into four quarters. Two quarters – Springhead and Northfleet Rise in the east – are under the jurisdiction of Gravesham council, while Station Quarter North and Station Quarter South in the west are overseen by Dartford council Transport The scheme is centred on the transport infrastructure coming into Ebbsfleet. This includes a local rapid transit system, Fastrack, which passes through the Eastern Quarry development, and the international high-speed rail link which will access London in 15 minutes and northern Europe in 90 minutes Developer Land Securities Timescale Work on Springhead, phase I of the development, will start this year. It will create 600 homes, tendered and secured by Countryside Properties, 500,000 sq ft of offices, a primary school and other community facilities. Springhead’s commercial element is called Ebbsfleet South. Ebbsfleet International Station is due to open in early 2007, while local transport links will be completed in 2009 Companies/organisations involved Kent Thameside regeneration projects are overseen by the Kent Thameside Delivery Board, set up last year. The board is a collaboration between regional and national organisations, and its responsibilities include a range of activities, from large-scale physical regeneration to business and community development. Board members include: Kent County Council, Gravesham council, Dartford council, English Partnerships, South East England Development Agency, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, Government Office for the South East, the Housing Corporation, Land Securities and London & Continental Railways |
Forty years ago, a new town meant an ultra-modern development with the latest in infrastructure, housing and amenities. Today, the term conjures up images of the huge mistakes made in building towns such as Milton Keynes, Crawley and East Grinstead. These isolated, soulless places are still paying for the initial under-estimation of their needs for amenities and infrastructure.
Tim Seddon, development director at Land Securities, winces every time the company’s redevelopment of Ebbsfleet Valley, near Dartford, Kent is referred to as a new town.
At the former Blue Circle-owned quarry, Ebbsfleet is an enormous development that is set to be the home to many new towns. Straddling the two local authority areas of Dartford and Gravesend, the development takes in not only the 378-acre Ebbsfleet Quarry, but also the nearby 640-acre Eastern Quarry.
Commercial space
When completed, in 20 years’ time, it will be home to an estimated 6m sq ft of commercial space, 3m sq ft of retail and leisure and 10,000 dwellings (see box).
The redevelopment’s catalyst has been the building of the high-speed Channel Tunnel Rail link station at Ebbsfleet, which will provide connections to Kings Cross St Pancras in just 15 minutes, and Paris in 90 minutes.
During the 40-minute train journey from London’s Charing Cross to Dartford last month, Seddon explained the lessons that have been learned from previous township development. He has taken examples from new towns all over the world – predominately in the US and Europe – and concluded that, for instance, small-scale schemes within the overall development will be key. There will be five “villages” in the Eastern Quarry alone.
“We have taken the best practice from other towns. We would like to think that, in 10 to 15 years, people will come and see how we have done things.”
Seddon’s optimism is not shared by everyone, however. Questions have been raised about the huge amount of office development planned for the area, and whether residential should be built before commercial. Chris Pieroni, head of research at Colliers CRE, warns LandSec to be careful not to let the residential areas “become nothing more than dormitories.”
Such is the scale of the office space being planned by LandSec that some pundits have compared it to the building of four towers at Canary Wharf. What worries the sceptics is the area’s untested office market.
Knight Frank’s Emma Goodford-Broer describes it, politely, as “immature”. In addition, LandSec’s nearby Crossways Business Park has almost 70,000 sq ft of empty units. “I can’t imagine LandSec building that kind of space and flooding the market without occupiers,” says John Wilkins, commercial partner with Cluttons.
Seddon says the company has no intention of doing any such thing. He claims that, due to a unique system of planning called quarter-masterplanning, whereby Ebbsfleet has been divided into quarters (see panel), not all of the office space will be developed at the same time.
“In each of the quarters there can only be a certain amount of development, and there are caps on what that development will be,” Seddon adds. Essentially, it means the developer would be able to develop the sector mostpertinent to the market at that time. Today, that would be residential. “Quarter-masterplanning gives us a degree of flexibility,” he says.
“To a certain extent, LandSec is hedging its bets to minimise its risk to what it could get away with first,” says Ian Lindsay, deputy chief executive of the Kent Thameside Delivery Board, the umbrella organisation set up to oversee Ebbsfleet’s development. “Given that the overall scheme will take 15 years to build, no doubt the masterplan will change somewhat.”
Remaining space
Answering criticism about Crossways’ empty units, Seddon insists the park is “ticking over nicely”, and promises an announcement on occupiers for the remaining space soon.
And some believe that getting occupiers for the Ebbsfleet office space, if and when it is built, will not be a problem either. Lindsay, for example, says the delivery board has been getting interest from as away as South Korea. Commentators also point to the attraction for business of the area’s high-speed rail links.
While there are questions over Ebbsfleet’s office development, there are no doubts about getting buyers for the planned 10,000 homes. Springhead, one of the four quarters, and under the jurisdiction of Gravesham council, will be the first residential development to be started. Alongside 500,000 sq ft of space for employment uses, Countryside Properties will begin the construction of 600 homes this year.
LandSec and the Thameside Delivery Board emphasis the need for the office sector to succeed, but the money clearly lies in residential. “LandSec already has massive investment in the area that it has to pay for, and an amount of residential clearly lets it turn a coin and get some return early,” says Lindsay, adding. “But it’s important that we get Ebbsfleet away as a commercial location.”
The emphasis on residential first, offices later, worries Pieroni. He believes that controls must be imposed after Ebbsfleet International Station is completed in 2007. “You can bet the housebuilders will move in. They already have. If all this area becomes is a dormitory, then that would be a mistake. What about all the elements of sustainable communities, like local jobs?” he asks.
Seddon points to the number of jobs that will be created, not only by occupiers for offices, but also by the station when it is fully operational. And Lindsay adds: “There’re a lot of jobs coming from other sites.” He points to Bluewater and Crossways, which together employ 12,000 people.
Much-lauded transport link
Mandy Bearne, director of retail and strategy for Locate in Kent, adds that the building of Ebbsfleet International Station will ensure sustainable communities.
However, the much-lauded transport link suffered a setback in November when the Department for Transport axed its proposed link to Crossrail. It decided instead to make Crossrail’s final eastern stop at Abbey Wood, eight stops short of Ebbsfleet. “Obviously, we would have liked to have had Crossrail. It was always going to be a nice additional bonus, but the main thing for us was always to get the Channel Tunnel link. That has always been the key plank in our travel plans,” says Lindsay.
That said, Lindsay reiterates the Kent Thameside Delivery Board’s main aim is for Ebbsfleet to become a key office centre. To make that happen, says Lindsay: “It’s important to us to get the office market off the ground.”The feeling among local agents is one of wait and see. Says Wilkins: “LandSec is creating a whole new market at Ebbsfleet Valley, and good luck to them.”
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Building the equivalent of a modern-day Milton Keynes out of nothing cannot fail to affect homes and businesses in the surrounding areas. Where the questions arise, however, is over whether the effect is good or bad. In the case of Land Securities’ mammoth regeneration of Ebbsfleet Valley, near Dartford, Kent, that debate is just beginning. At the end of the 20-year Ebbsfleet project, due to start this year, 10,000 homes, and 10.8m sq ft of retail and leisure will be added to Kent Thameside. It will be either a massive boost or death knell for the nearby towns of Dartford, Gravesend, and Tilbury, and for those slightly further away, such as Maidstone, Canterbury and Thanet. Commentators are focusing on the proposed retail, leisure and residential sectors to gauge the development’s possible impact on these towns. And on that basis, the surrounding towns will survive, if not thrive. The opening of Kent’s 1.6m sq ft Bluewater shopping centre in March 1999 had an immediate impact on local retail markets. Over the next six months, Bromley, Gravesend, Dartford and Maidstone saw retail sales hit. However, the towns quickly rallied, with some using the “Bluewater effect” to push forward their own multimillion-pound town regeneration schemes. Retail developments in Thanet, Canterbury and Maidstone totalling more than 1m sq ft are all set for completion over next few months (see p??). Gravesham and Dartford councils are also pushing ahead with regeneration schemes. These were boosted last July when the ODPM allocated £54m to back the projects. “Gravesend and Dartford have their own niche markets with value shopping,” says Ian Lindsay, deputy chief executive of the Kent Thameside Delivery Board, the umbrella organisation set up to oversee development in the area. Lindsay adds that the amount of residential planned for Ebbsfleet will increase the catchment populations for all the nearby centres. Even Bluewater, next door to Ebbsfleet, is looking forward to the development. Bluewater’s general manager, David Robinson, says: “One of the reasons we [developer Lend Lease] chose the Bluewater site was because of the longer term developments planned for the area. The opportunity for growth in the region is significant.” Robinson says he expects the evening economy of cafes and restaurants to be boosted with the development in the Eastern Quarry, part of the Ebbsfleet Valley next to Bluewater. Lindsay claims that Ebbsfleet’s retail developments will complement Bluewater’s offer. “Bluewater is a regional shopping draw, whereas Ebbsfleet will be convenient shopping,” he adds. While the impact of Ebbsfleet’s retail and leisure developments on surrounding towns may still be hypothetical, the same cannot be said of the huge amount of planned residential. Even before it has been built, Ebbsfleet International Station is having an impact on surrounding areas. According to David Parry, partner in residential development at Cluttons, “there is already interest from developers for that area, and we have noticed house prices have risen reasonably strongly. And that’s all down to the Ebbsfleet regeneration”. Parry says that the average price for a three-bedroom house in nearby Dartford has risen substantially. Meanwhile, the impact on prices in Gravesend has been even greater. Parry says that, in the year to the end of September, values around Gravesham rose 17.5% compared with 11.5% in London. In addition, the homes planned for Ebbsfleet will be cheaper than those in the surrounding areas. “It’s a reasonably affordable area compared with Sussex,” he says. A joint venture between LandSec and Countryside Properties will start the first residential development of 600 units this year at the Springhead quadrant of the Ebbsfleet site. |
