Who would you trust to whistle up a mega-mall in London? British Hammerson or Aussie Westfield? Both are vying to rebuild the Whitgift Centre. Long leaseholder Royal London came out in favour of Hammerson this week. Freeholder The Whitgift Foundation says no, no, we want Westfield.
That leaves Croydon council two choices: back Royal London and Hammerson or back the Whitgift and Westfield.
There is, maybe, a third option. Grab every party’s ears and bang heads together until the promise to construct a loose joint venture to rebuild the whole town centre is extracted.
There is, after all, plenty to go round. Hammerson has the adjacent Centrale centre. To the south lies the permanently-stalled Park Place retail development. But Westfield is as likely to enter a jv with Hammerson as it is to build a parade of shops in East Cheam. Meanwhile, Croydon badly needs a retail heart transplant.
At this point it would be fair to judiciously weigh up the pros and cons of both parties. Blow that. The need for a swift decision – followed by an emergency operation – draws close for ailing Croydon. Hammerson’s last mega-mall in London was Brent Cross, which first opened in 1976. Westfield has built two in 10 years. No contest.
Hammerson has spent years dithering with a multi-billion-pound development at Cricklewood that includes an extension to Brent Cross. The plans are not even listed in the accounts as to be developed in the next four years.
The last enclosed mega-mall built in the UK was The Bullring in Birmingham, which opened nine years ago. It took not one but three UK companies to do the job: Hammerson and Land Securities, with Henderson supplying the money. The truth is that no single UK developer is now big enough to risk £1bn-£2bn on a mega-mall.
There is only one company outside the US that can: Westfield. The Aussies directly employ hundreds of design and construction staff, all with unmatchable global experience. “We can see an immediate and narrow window of opportunity” with Westfield, says the Whitgift. To translate: if the council dithers, Westfield will go walkabout.
That would certainly please Develop Croydon. The local business lobby group has backed Hammerson in a statement this week that ended with a reminder to the world about how kind Hammerson was to sponsor Develop Croydon’s jaunt to MIPIM this year. There are times when you would feel more proud being an Aussie.
Progress at Walkie Talkie
Canary Wharf’s construction team completed the thick 38-storey concrete core of the Walkie Talkie in Fenchurch Street last week with no visible celebration. A 600-ft tower crane has now been bolted to the core, distanced on long yellow arms, like a preying mantis.
It looks like LandSec has been invisibly busy as well, on what taxi drivers will never learn to call 20 Fenchurch Street. The other half of the jv partnership seems close to getting one or two insurance companies to rent space in the 690,000 sq ft tower. Good work.
I jokingly suggested in the Evening Standard on 16 March that Lloyd’s of London might be one of the insurers thinking of moving to 20 Fenchurch Street. Why? Because its iconic tower is costly to maintain and the lease expires in 2021. German Fund CIL put the Lloyd’s building on the market eight months ago for £290m. No takers so far.
Double-speak Telegraph
On 28 March, the Daily Telegraph signalled surrender over its rabid “save the countryside” campaign with a full-width, double-deck, front- page headline declaring the largely unchanged planning guidelines meant “a good day for anyone who cares about our countryside”.
Balls. The original guidance never was a developer’s charter. The fig leaves added by planning minister Greg Clark to cover the Telegraph‘s blushes make little difference. Clark deserves great credit for not giving way to a paper reduced to spouting double-speak.
