Planners have agreed a state-of-the-art office scheme that will revive the stalled regeneration of Leeds’ industrial waterfront.
Acquired in 2013 by Allied London after the pre-crash failure of a previous council attempt to rebrand and regenerate the city’s Victorian Clarence Dock, a former Alea casino site looks set to get a 70,000 sq ft “super-building”.
To be called The Engine, the Leeds Dock building will offer “super-specified, flexible workspace space full of technology assets” targeted at creative, media and technology businesses.
“The creation of The Engine presents a unique opportunity for Leeds,” said Allied London’s chief executive officer, Michael Ingall. “Too many of the new, planned and vacant buildings in the city offer just a simple and traditional ‘one-size-fits-all’ office space.
“This isn’t how the modern business wants to use space,” he added. “We are being inundated with demand for this workspace building model in Manchester and London’s Farringdon, and our careful market research tells us there will be similar significant demand for this product in Leeds.”
Ingall said The Engine project has already generated a lot of interest and will strengthen the Yorkshire capital’s attraction to inward investors — “Our current activity is quickly showing people the potential of what will be a new city centre community, and The Engine will be perfectly positioned as the workspace super building within what we hope will become an important new neighbourhood for Leeds.”
To attract more people into the dockside, Leeds council has also agreed to support a new shuttle bus to the railway station and city centre and improve signage and bicycle routes. And at the start of the summer Allied London launched a water taxi service, which is also proving popular.
“We are creating an inclusive fusion of architecture, landscaping, culture, leisure and modern industry to provide a genuine mixed use destination,” said Ingall. “We will transform and re-energise this vital part of the Leeds — giving the city back the waterfront it deserves.”
New Dock, just 600 yards south of the city centre, was originally built in 1843 for boats using the Leeds and Liverpool Canal and the Aire and Calder Navigation. It was renamed Clarence Dock in the early 2000s when Crosby Homes started a regeneration programme, but many of the ground floor retail and commercial units have remained vacant since their 2008 completion.
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