John Atkins, Manchester Airport Group’s property director, has suggested that Manchester’s Airport City will become the most significant development project in the UK since the regeneration of East London began in 2005 for the Olympics.
“With five million sq ft of new highly-connected business space planned over the next ten years, Airport City is introducing a new concept to the UK, taking Manchester Airport beyond its traditional use as a regional transport hub and transforming it into an international business destination in its own right.
“The development will provide a major regeneration opportunity for the surrounding Wythenshawe area and help to further boost Manchester’s attractiveness as a major European Business City.”
Marketing Stockport believe that Stockport’s economy will also be boosted by the transformation of the area in and around Airport City:
Director of PR & Marketing at Marketing Stockport Helen White said:
“It is fantastic to see a development of this magnitude on our doorstep and a great opportunity for the local business community.
“Stockport is already home to innovation and to many world-class brands; the North West already boasts a successful, thriving, vibrant and developing economy; while we accept there are still challenges ahead, such as Media City in Salford has already re-focussed the eyes of the UK outside of the capital and Airport City will attract global attention”.
John Atkins, (above) Manchester Airport Group’s property director, discusses the potential regenerative powers of the group’s landmark development – Airport City:
“It will complement, rather than compete with current real estate assets, such as the city centre and Media City, and provide within the Manchester Enterprise Zone an estimated 16,000 new jobs over the next decade. To that end, Airport City Manchester will become the most significant development project in the UK since the regeneration of East London began in 2005 for the Olympics.”
How is MAG involving Greater Manchester in its development?
“The need for urban renewal is identified through our Community Relations team, who do a great deal with the local area and community to ensure the airport is investing in the region and ensuring its future, not only from an economic point of view but also socially and environmentally as well. And having the councils of the ten Greater Manchester Boroughs as our major shareholders ensures we work very closely with the region to ensure economic development.
We combine this community involvement with that of a range of partners including the inward investment agency, Midas, shareholders in the form of AGMA, Marketing Manchester where several of our senior directors sit on the board, government agencies such as UKTI, trade bodies, chambers of commerce and associations to ensure we are attracting a range of people to Manchester to showcase what the city has to offer tourists and business travellers.
What safeguards does MAG have in providing jobs for locals throughout AC?
Through a collaborative working process with major stakeholders of Greater Manchester, the Airport has created an employment strategy for Airport City that will link various schemes promoted across Greater Manchester to the Airport City project.
To help and ensure local communities can benefit from jobs at Airport City Manchester, and the Airport, we are working closely with our Airport Academy that was set up four years ago. It offers local unemployed people the opportunity to complete a two week course. Upon completion of the course, successful participants have a nationally recognised customer services qualification, as well as receiving help with interview skills and preparing their CVs.
Course participants also have the opportunity to take up a work placement at Manchester Airport. We are hoping the people using the Academy now, will be able to get back into work and learn the skills needed for when Airport City is a reality. During 2013 the Academy helped over 100 people find a job and almost half of these were at the airport.
How will AC help not only Manchester’s, but the UK’s economy?
I believe Airport City will play a part in attracting new long haul airline routes to Manchester, to support and serve the requirements of the global businesses that will be based on-site, which in turn bring further growth, employment and destination options. This then in turns increases tourism to the region and the secondary spend that brings.
But Airport City will help the wider UK economy. The Airport City joint venture deal presents one of the biggest investments into the UK at the moment, which is good news for everyone. Being a UK first, Airport City will also hopefully attract global companies that may never even have considered this country before, which as well as leading to additional employment growth will deliver increased revenue for the UK through Government taxation.
What will Airport City look like post-development?
Land for Airport City Manchester was acquired ahead of the scheme being promoted and the project is therefore being developed on airport controlled land. To bring Airport City to life, we will reconfigure and move elements of the airport’s offering, such as car parks, to new areas to create the space needed for the £800m development.
Airport City Manchester will be a place people want to move to, not just because they have to re-locate their business. We have extreme confidence in Argent’s ‘place-making’ credentials and believe they will create a space that will appeal to a wide range of stakeholders including business leaders, their employees and the wider community.
The centrepiece of the proposed development is a new 13-acre central park, surrounded by a ‘downtown’ district of distinctive contemporary buildings and high quality public areas. The Central Park will also integrate with the existing green spaces in the vicinity and provide greater connectivity and a series of regenerative enhancements to the adjacent Woodhouse Park housing estate, already home to many airport workers.
New retail and amenities will occupy the ground floor level of key buildings to create a ‘high street’, featuring the traditional components of a conventional city centre such as: shops, cafes, bars, restaurants, crèches, health and medical centres, dry cleaners, gym and leisure facilities.
What will people’s journey to work be like?
The majority of workers and visitors will not drive to Airport City – instead they will walk, cycle, take a tram, bus, train or a plane.
A great deal of infrastructure works is already taking place around Manchester Airport, all of which will benefit and feed into Airport City and the project makes use of existing infrastructure.
Recently the Chancellor George Osborne announced plans for a fourth platform at our train station, which as well as increasing capacity and frequency, will add new direct destinations to the station including Halifax and Bradford.
The Manchester light rail system – Metrolink is under construction and is scheduled to open in 2016, linking the Airport, South Manchester and the City Centre.
Manchester Airport is also planned to have a station on the proposed high-speed rail network. HS2 represents the biggest expansion of the UK’s rail network since Victorian times and will provide much needed improved connectivity to Manchester from the Midlands and the South East. Journey times from London to Manchester will be reduced to around 70 minutes; Birmingham will be within 30 minutes. This will further improve the transport connections to Airport City.
It’s not only the railways seeing significant investment this year, as the A6 extension road is gaining strong momentum, with funding and a joint venture in place for the project. As well as opening up access to the east and bypassing Heald Green, the new road will also form part of the wider infrastructure for the Airport City North site. Couple this with our strong ground transportation plans such as new cycle-ways and footbridges, Airport City will make the airport extremely accessible to people locally, regionally and nationally.
Source: Global Airport Cities
Image from Global Airport Cities