Work starts at Yorkshire’s first speculative office development

Work is underway on a new 19,500 sq ft office development on the outskirts of Wakefield city centre.

The complex comprises six detached and semi-detached two-storey buildings and will be the region’s first out-of-town speculative office development for more than five years.

The development, which is being marketed by national commercial property consultancy Lambert Smith Hampton, will be built on a 1.5-acre site at Calder Park in Wakefield, and will offer ‘grade A’ accommodation aimed at SMEs.

The 240-acre park is already home to over 70 occupiers, including Minster Law, the Highways Agency, the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors and the Yorkshire Scientific Support Unit.

Adam Varley, head of office agency at LSH in Leeds, said: “The first phase of the development at Calder Park was a tremendous success and with confidence returning to the occupier market, Gladman’s decision to start back on site shows its commitment to and confidence in Calder Park.

“The business park itself has some very high profile occupiers who have been attracted by the convenient access to the motorway and the quality and design of the site and buildings. We feel the market is definitely ready for an injection of new stock and we already have strong interest in the new offices.”

The new buildings are being constructed by Cheshire-based developer Gladman and are due for completion in early 2014.

Matt McIntosh, development manager at Gladman, said: “There is a really positive feeling in the industry at the moment and we feel that now is the right time to get back on track with developments. Yorkshire and Calder Park are established business locations and the fundamentals of the site remain one of the key drivers in our decision to speculatively develop these units.

“Given the lack of development in the Wakefield office market, we expect demand for space to be driven by businesses with the confidence to expand.”

Calder Park, which is owned by Peel Land & Property, has detailed planning consent for up to 1.5 million sq ft (139,355 sq m) of bespoke office accommodation. The park is located off junction 39 of the M1 motorway, providing easy access to Wakefield, Leeds and Sheffield, and is a short drive from Leeds Bradford Airport.

A speculative office building is a development without tenants, in the hope that tenants will sign up on completion.

The buildings are being jointly marketed by letting agents Lambert Smith Hampton and WSB Property Consultants in Leeds.