The developers who brought Hitachi Rail Europe to Newton Aycliffe are back with another exciting new large-scale development.
Merchant Anglo, the company behind Merchant Park, home to Hitachi’s £82m factory which opened three years ago, is now planning to build three new units near to the rail manufacturing facility covering a total 25 acres.
The new Station Place development will build on the solid elements that made Merchant Park perfect for Hitachi Rail – namely excellent transport links for rail, road, sea and air, and a developer committed to providing fit-for-purpose flexible space.
Station Place aims to build on that strong base and provide much needed high quality industrial units from 5,000 sq ft.
The three units – one up to 193,000 sq ft (8.55 acres), one up to 82,000 sq ft (3.2 acres) and the third up to 312,000 sq ft (13 acres) – are scheduled to be available by summer 2019.
Geoff Hunton, from Merchant Anglo, who was credited with playing a major part in persuading Hitachi to choose Aycliffe other several other UK options, told Aycliffe Today: “We’re looking to take the development of Merchant Park forward with the next phase of our development, and building new units for the future.
“It’s been a long time coming. It took us quite a while to bring Hitachi here, but we did it once and we believe we’ve been successful in bringing a large number of jobs to the area, not just direct with Hitachi but also through the supply chain.
“Economic development in the UK as a whole is moving away from large-scale developments such as Hitachi, but we see a demand in Newton Aycliffe for 5-10,000 sq ft units.
“We want to provide state-of-the-art new facilities for existing businesses in and around Aycliffe to expand to.
National firm of chartered surveyors Sanderson Weatherall has been appointed alongside joint agents CBRE to market the units.
Chris Dent, head of industrial agency for the North East at Sanderson Weatherall, said: “Station Place represents a new chapter in the evolution of industrial space in Newton Aycliffe, which we are excited to be a part of.
“We know there is demand for smaller flexible high quality industrial units that simply isn’t being catered for – Station Place will tick the boxes for that market.”