A New Year

Re: A New Year

Hi, Happy New Year too. It would be great to see these areas redeveloped. I was wondering if there is any indication of an approximate start on site date yet for the Swindon College, Union Square and Jury's Hotel sites, as I believe these schemes must almost be ready for construction now. Many thanks, Mark

Re: A New Year

Both the Swindon College scheme and Jury's Hotel are in the planning process with the college site been granted local authority approval and are now waiting on Government Office of SW approval which could come through in the next month. The hotel is further behind and still awaiting planning approval. We are hopefull that both schemes will start in the next few months.

The development agreement for Union Square is likely to be signed in the next two months. The developer can then get on with the planning approval process which takes a minimum of 4 months on a scheme of this size.

Re: A New Year

This is good news for Swindon the sooner we see action the better. Is there any news on the new Swindon Health Centre development is this part of this development?

Re: A New Year

Hi there,

I?ve just read an article on the Property Week website regarding Swindon?s regeneration.

The overall impression I received was that things are happening very, very slowly and essentially ?don?t expect anything any time soon?. The insinuation was that development in Swindon takes a long time ? is this fair? Is it harder to ?see through? a development project in Swindon and if so, why? I appreciate ?it?s complex? and ?we all want the best outcome we can get?, but will we ever see any outcome? This is a serious question, not just flippancy.

I assume that Property Week is a respected trade publication (?) and it seems even they are becoming sceptical about the regeneration?

I see the latest expected start date for Regent Place is now March 2009. Is this in any way realistic or will this turn into Summer 2009, Autumn 2009 etc? Again, this is a serious question.

Also, at the beginning of last month you said you expected the development agreement to be signed within a couple of months ? is this still a likelihood?

This is no rant, just looking for an update and some glimmer of optimism!

Thanks for your help and good work ? lets hope the great ideas materialise.

Ben

Re: A New Year

Thanks very much for your comment and for keeping up to date ? it?s good to know people are interested and keeping on top of everything that?s going on.

In response to your comment about the feature in ?Property Week? I want to reassure you that the vision for a regenerated vision will become reality. The unfortunate fact, however, is that in working towards developing Swindon town Centre, there are many rigorous planning processes to go through, and as is always the case in these things, delays unexpectedly arise meaning some of our plans may be put back.

I do believe though that change is already happening in Swindon ? Wharf Green, our first area of re-development, is due to finish shortly with the completion of the installation of the BBC Big Screen, and we will be having a launch week in May.

Masterplanners have been appointed for The Promenade, meaning that sometime in the next few months we should see a plan for what will happen in this regeneration zone. And we are also anticipating the signing of the development agreement for Union Square very shortly, which again will be a big move forward.

You are correct when you say development in Swindon takes a long time ? there are many processes to go through and it is important to ensure all plans are perfect before they are put into action.

I can understand that it seems like we have been talking about regeneration for a while and yet not a lot has happened ? however I can assure you that behind the scenes, plans are moving forward, and we will get the Swindon we want.

Regards

TNSC