Council seeking a way ahead for Slough Central

Council officers in Slough are seeking Government help to find a way forward for the stalled regeneration of the town centre.

Pat Hayes, executive director of housing & property for Slough Borough Council, told delegates at last Tuesday’s Re-imagining Slough event that the evolution of the Slough Central scheme exemplifies what has happened to the UK property market over recent years.

The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA)-owned scheme to redevelop the Queensmere and Observatory shopping centres for a massive mixed-use proposal, was consented in 2022 after two major revisions, but little has happened since.

Development manager British Land had been expected to build up to 1,600 new homes, 12,000 sq m of retail and 40,000 sq m of offices and 3,750 sq m of leisure/performance space in a scheme that would take up to 14 years to complete.

Mr Hayes told the meeting at Plus X Innovation’s base at The Future Works, ADIA has no UK staff, which presents a challenge.

He went on: “How do we move this scheme forward? This is a scheme that, in many ways, is an example of what has happened in the UK property market. They bought it in 2017, it was going to be a massive retail shopping centre on the model of Westfield – but better.

“Of course, the retail market has totally changed. Even Westfield in East London is actually struggling if you look at the vacancies there, so the chances of redeveloping a new Westfield further west than Hammersmith are nil.

“The scheme then went through a metamorphosis and it was going to be an office-based scheme. Offices were very strong in this part of the world – there’s a lot of very good quality office accommodation including the one we are sitting in.

“Office occupancy now, post-Covid and the move to a different way of working, is very very challenging. There’s lots of surplus office space in this peripheral, out-of-London, London fringe location so it’s never going to come forward as an office-based scheme.

“It’s now got consent as a residential scheme but the value isn’t there effectively at the moment.”

While the council is seeking to work on ‘meanwhile’ uses and keeping the area tidy, Mr Hayes said options for helping fund the development are being explored with Government as well as possible options to help ADIA sell the site.

He said: “Our existential challenge is we have a major landowner who has a scheme – a non-viable scheme effectively.

“How can we work with them to make that scheme viable? Is there public sector funding from Central Government we can bring in to make that scheme viable or to enable the current owners to move on in a way that they can exit and bring somebody else in to develop it?

“That’s where we are at the moment in terms of a very dynamic discussion with Central Government about the opportunities to support and bring that scheme forward, or to develop that exit strategy for its current owners. So it is a real challenge.”

He said compulsory purchase would be unlikely to succeed because a consented scheme exists. The council is currently putting pressure on ADIA to improve the look of 4.82-hectare site as it is.