With heightened uncertainty, new work-from-home guidelines for thousands of employees and restrictions temporarily halting work on construction sites nationwide, new commercial developments like Newcastle’s AirView Park could not have predicted the months (and year) ahead back at the start of 2020.
Like other companies, Tynexe Commercial Ltd, the developers behind the 175,000 sq ft scheme next to Newcastle International Airport, decided to keep driving forward with confidence and optimism while swiftly adapting to change.
News included announcing future plans for the site in May, that construction had resumed on anchor tenant Bellway plc’s purpose-built HQ in June, and officially welcoming the national homebuilder to its new 21,000 sq ft building in September.
Encouragingly, more positive signs continued month on month including news that the airport had started to welcome back business routes including London Heathrow, Amsterdam, Aberdeen, Dusseldorf and Paris, and commercial property enquiries were still being received despite a very unpredictable and unstable market. This was encouraged by local businesses considering out of town locations like AirView Park and national companies looking to the North East as a strategic regional or northern base.
Mike Clark of Tynexe Commercial Ltd, explained, “We could never have predicted that 2020 would turn out the way it has, and who knows what is around the corner in 2021, but despite the initial setbacks that the construction industry faced in Q1, there was also a very determined, ‘can-do’, ‘power on through’ attitude amongst the majority of the North East’s business community.
“AirView Park was and still is in a very fortunate position in that we offer a prime location for road and air business connectivity, and can deliver a very bespoke, design-led office building for individual organisations from scratch. Given the changes that we have seen this year and the requirements now expected of modern working environments, this has been an important factor in attracting site enquiries and we’re continuing to work closely with a number of potential occupiers to deliver the second phase of the scheme in 2021.
“The North East is taking positive steps in the right direction and commercial property schemes like ours, only partly out of the ground, provide a lot of flexibility. Companies in a fortunate enough position can potentially kick start their long terms plans and build for the future now, reaping the rewards later down the line when the recovery is well on its way and the economy is stronger. There is certainly an underlying confidence amongst many regional businesses at the moment and having a very strategic location like AirView Park can only be a good thing.”
