WSP and Indigo teams combine at First Street
After the merger of the two companies earlier this year, Indigo’s team of 19 is to move out of St James’s Tower on Charlotte Street to create a group of nearly 50 planners at WSP’s No8 First Street office in Manchester.
WSP bought the consultant in April to create a team of planners under the WSP | Indigo banner, with Indigo’s offices in Manchester, Leeds, London, Birmingham, and Dublin all joining forces with the engineering and professional services giant.
Indigo’s Manchester team will complete its move into No8 First Street on 30 September. WSP | Indigo’s national planning team is headed up by Darren Oldham and Gareth Howells, who are both based at First Street. WSP’s Manchester office covers around 55,000 sq ft over two floors.
Doug Hann, executive director at WSP | Indigo, said: “We’re delighted to be moving under one roof with our WSP colleagues. We’ve built a strong reputation here in the North West over the last 20 years and this marks a new chapter which will enable the team to expand its service to clients; combining our commercial planning expertise with WSP’s public sector and infrastructure experience.
“Our focus will remain serving our commercial developer, housebuilder, landowner and operator clients, who will continue to benefit from our detailed local knowledge in the North-West, supported by the world-class expertise of WSP.”
Indigo was founded more than 30 years ago and has grown to become one of the largest planning-focused consultancies in the UK, while WSP has recently grown its planning team with a series of senior hires.
The deal follows another of the region’s most prominent planning outfits joining forces with a larger consultancy, How Planning’s acquisition by GVA having been completed in May last year – both parties now coming under the Avison Young banner.
