Model

Development area next to Exhibition Centre Liverpool

MIPIM UK | YPG application due for further Kings Dock development

Willmott Dixon PNG

Place North West partner

YPG is targeting November to submit its next planning application at Liverpool’s Kings Dock, as the council’s preferred developer for 102 flats, a heritage centre and multi-storey car park, to be built alongside the proposed call centre YPG is delivering for The Contact Company.

YPG and the council released images yesterday of their vision for the Monarch’s Quay site, the final 11-acre piece of undeveloped land at the former southern docklands.

In August, YPG’s architect Falconer Chester Hall submitted a planning application for a 45,000 sq ft call centre which is set to be let to LEP chairman Asif Hamid’s The Contact Company. The plans for an office on the prime waterfront site, which is publicly owned, have been met with hostility by developers, who have questioned the appropriateness of the location, and whether an office requirement would be better served by proposed commercial schemes such as Pall Mall.

The city council’s overall vision is to deliver a mixed-use development, which would create a leisure, commercial and retail destination. The intention is for the site to be developed in three phases, with 120 apartments, the 7,500 sq ft ‘heritage interpretation centre’ and a car park anchoring phase two; with 280 homes, a winter garden and improved public realm in phase three. The council bought the site from the HCA earlier this year, using most of a £6m pot from the Regional Growth Fund.

While YPG was known as the developer for the call centre, it has not previously been confirmed that YPG was also set to build the next phase of homes, heritage centre and car park.

At MIPIM UK, Place North West met with Ming Yeung, chief executive of YPG.

Ming was born in China, but moved to Grimsby with his parents when he was six years old. His financial backers are largely Chinese, he said, as well as a mix of traditional bank lending.

The developer is relatively unknown in the Liverpool market, but is completing the student accommodation conversion of Pembroke Studios, as well as 204 flats in the Baltic Triangle, and the recently approved hotel conversion at Renshaw House.

According to Ming, he moved into the Liverpool market “because it is ripe for redevelopment, the city council are supportive, it is straightforward to get planning and the land values are affordable.”

Taking its own stand at MIPIM UK rather than joining the joint Manchester & Liverpool stand had proved fruitful for YPG, Ming said, as at the conference the company has secured “£4m of investment from returning Chinese investors”.

On the Kings Dock development, Ming said that YPG was targeting breaking ground on the TCC block by February, planning permission permitting. However, the developer is still in negotiations with the council on the project, with the final development agreement yet to be confirmed.

Ming is “hopeful” that the company would also be selected as the council’s developer on the later leisure phases at Kings Dock, “should the first phase go well”.

  • MIPIM UK coverage is brought to you in association with Willmott Dixon. Place North West can be found on stand H34

Your Comments

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A heritage centre? err… why?

By Du Be Ous

“because it is ripe for redevelopment, the city council are supportive, it is straightforward to get planning and the land values are affordable.”

Interesting.

By James Arnold

So that consultation they’re running is really worthwhile, isn’t it?

By Mike

What a crock of ****. A toy town sized go anywhere call centre full of crap jobs, cheap and nasty leisure uses, and a successful exhibition centre permanently hemmed in and stopped from future expansion. Anderson though has probably had it spoon fed to him by one of his officers that it’s visionary, so no doubt thinks it’s great.

By Morgan

Build another multi-storey next to an existing multi-storey? Forward thinking.

What exactly is a heritage interpretation centre?

I also do not remember this site being openly marketed. Standard Council.

By Mr Smith

Is this a joke? Why aren’t LCC in discussion with reputable developers with a proven track record?

By Shock

I missed the open and transparent marketing on this one. When was that?

By Dave

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