Commercial property: New arrival boosts east end of Glasgow

SPIE, a leading UK provider of vital multi-technical services, has agreed to become the first tenant of One Rutheglen Links, a £5m development by regeneration body Clyde Gateway on a formerly vacant and derelict site.

The firm is to establish a single Scottish headquarters in this high profile, four storey, landmark building, noticed by thousands of drivers every day as it sits alongside the M74 motorway extension.

The company is taking a total of 17,709 sq ft, the top two floors of the Grade A offices, where the rental is around £17 per sq ft, saving more than £10 a foot on equivalent city centre accommodation and providing the mobility and fast motorway access needed by this type of business.

There’s no reduction in quality either. This is a energy efficient and low cost prime office building, designed by architects BDP as the first property in a wider business park. With ‘excellent’ BREEAM and an EPC rating of A, its heating, lighting and running costs are projected at 50 per cent of standard new office buildings.

With shower facilities on every floor, this is the first new office project in Rutherglen for around 40 years. It is two minutes from the road network, yards from the busy railway station, and has views across the changing east end towards Celtic Park, the Emirates Arena and Velodrome, the new police HQ at Dalmarnock, and on to the city centre three miles away.

One of only a handful of speculative new builds of this type in recent years and a venture some considered a brave call, it has been rewarded with a strong initial letting of more than half its space. One 9000 sq ft floor remains, with smaller ground level units.

SPIE, who were recently awarded an £80m four-year contract with Scottish Power Energy Networks to work on distribution and transmission programmes, employ 3500 people in regional offices around the UK, with the task of providing energy, safety and environmentally focused solutions for companies.

The move to One Rutherglen Links will bring together the 141 staff currently operating from a number of different premises across Lanarkshire and provide the space SPIE will require to grow to 170 full time jobs under its target expansion plans.

Lord Smith of Kelvin, chair of Clyde Gateway, said he was delighted by their choice: "SPIE are part of a very welcome surge in the number of firms and organisations who recognise how much this area can offer in terms of the quality and location of the business space.

"There is easy access to public transport and motorway links, together with highly competitive rental levels, all of which have helped us attract more than 4500 jobs for the area over the past few years. Around 85 per cent of the 500,000 sq ft of completed business space is now occupied.

"There is something of a shortage of new, affordable quality office stock in and around the city, but our commitment to speculative developments at a number of locations across Clyde Gateway will help address this gap."

In brief: New space reduces in city centre

The dwindling amount of new build Grade A office space in Glasgow city centre has eroded further since the turn of the year, with two more significant lettings.

Registers of Scotland has signed up for a new Glasgow base on the 17,294 sq ft third floor of developer Abstract’s St Vincent Plaza, taking a 15-year lease at a rental of £24 per sq ft.

They will move later this year from Hanover House, Douglas Street, to join KPMG and distiller Whyte and Mackay as tenants in the 11 storey office tower alongside the M8 near Charing Cross.

Elsewhere, law firm Shepherd and Wedderburn has agreed to relocate its office from 191 West George Street to the 143,000 sq ft 1 West Regent Street.

The firm are taking a ten-year lease on 13,700 sq ft in the virtually column-free new building developed by M&G Real Estate and a fund managed by Clearbell Capital.

Other tenants include global engineering firm Weir Group, professional services companies Arup and FDM, Global media and CMS.

In Aberdeen it is property agents themselves stimulating the market, with CBRE expanding into a purpose designed office at 1 Albyn Terrace.

Staffing in the new environment has increased but this is described as an open plan and ‘paperless’ world, with no ‘assigned desks’. Any employees struggling for a space can sit in the comfortable break-out areas.

Ediston home in on Edinburgh

Edinburgh-based commercial property investor, developer and asset manager, Ediston Real Estate has launched a new house building brand, Ediston Homes, which has its first project underway in the capital.

The development at The Fruitmarket in Chesser, will deliver 34 semi-detached and terraced houses for sale and 80 flats for rent under the government’s National Housing Trust initiative on affordable housing.

The new company’s board includes Harry O’Donnell, previously
of Miller, Peter Brogan, formerly of Muir Homes, Bob Millar,
formerly of Scottish Homes and established Ediston director
Andy McKinlay.

Ediston Property Investment Company this week bought a modern office building in Newcastle from Hanro Ltd for £18.95m, its 13th acquisition since the REIT launched on the main London stock market in October 2014.

Tenants of the 63,524 sq ft Citygate building include EY and the purchase reflects a net initial yield of 6.57 per cent.