Tag: Blightwells

Please Waverley, tell us you haven’t gambled a £17m black hole like Surrey Heath!

closingdownSurrey Heath Council recently spent £17.6m buying the freehold of the Camberley House of Fraser building. The money was completely borrowed from the Government’s Public Works scheme – so they didn’t even have the money themselves! Casino gambling at it’s best.

THIS WEEK HOUSE OF FRASER PULLED THE PLUG ON ITS CAMBERLEY STORE – serving a CVA on the council no less!

The Council said: “By acquiring the freehold of this site, Surrey Heath did so as part of the wider regeneration of its town and not as an investment. The store has suffered from under-investment over the years and the Council was in discussion with them to address this. Whilst these discussions are still ongoing, their own reinvestment proposals are dependent on a formal CVA and their position on legacy stores.”

This is the massive ANCHOR store for Camberley – not something easily re-let – or even turned into flats in the current climate!

We know Waverley Borough and Surrey County Councils have invested in the disastrous Blightwells in Farnham, and we know Waverley agreed to borrow £30million to buy some commercial property early in the year. Surely this is a risk too far?

Isn’t it time to come clean Waverley and publish a list of whats going on? After all if we suddenly all have a half share in a shopping centre in Runcorn, perhaps there will be more incentive for us to visit!!

WW sees trouble ahead?

How refreshing to see Godalming’s new boy on Waverley’s block speaking up on our behalf, and asking questions.  However, watch out boyo, we foresee trouble ahead – ask Farnham Residents’ councillor Jerry Hyman, who we understand from an officer, has been brought before the standards board on more than one occasion for asking too many questions? 

Despite being outnumbered, outflanked by heavyweight tories unused to being Screen Shot 2018-01-17 at 19.45.34.pngchallenged, and a rather intimidating veiled rebuke from Mistress Betsy at the Joint Planning Committee meeting last week, Paul Follows the Liberal Democrat Councillor for (Godalming Central & Ockford) didn’t turn a hair of his meticulously coiffed young head as he challenged the  council’s decision-making process. He wanted to know why the controversial Blightwells redevelopment wasn’t getting anywhere! A scheme – which was,  “going on when I was at secondary school”.  Did anyone laugh? No way Jose!

Confidence exudes from this young man, and long may it be so, – here’s his profile for the by-election just before Christmas Ding, Dong the fight’s begun to win Godalming’s By-Election. Part 1.Lib Dems.

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Wow! his work covers standards, legal compliance, and ethical conduct! If that’s the case then he’s in for a field day at ‘Your Waverley’ and we hate to think what he might uncover when he digs into the latest shenanigans in his new role  at Godalming Town Council!   Dare we suggest he starts looking into why the Clerk left?  How much she was actually paid?  Not quite the £30,000  which appears in the annual accounts?  

No surprise to us here at the Waverley Web to hear that some parish clerks around the borough are being bullied – except of course the ‘crystal tips’ clerk of most of the councils in the East – Dunsfold/Hascombe/Alfold/Loxwood who appears to run the show on councillors’ behalf! 

Perhaps  Councillor Follows will delve into why Councillor Anne Bott (now Town Mayor following the sudden resignation of Mayor Simon Thornton) is allowed a conflict of interest as she is employed by The Surrey & Sussex Association of Local Councils) funded, in part, by Godalming Town Council. Of course, most of us realise parish councils are no longer the autonomous parochial bodies they once were! They are now controlled by Conservative dominated Waverley, which is, in turn, controlled by South West Surrey and Guildford and Cranleigh Conservative Association.

So, Councillor Paul Follows,  we look forward with some trepidation to watching your progress over the coming year. But, be warned, if you rattle their cages too often your opponents will stack everything up against you next May!  But then you don’t appear to be a guy who scares easily!

 

They cannot make the Farnham Herald’s letters page big enough to take the complaints against ‘Your Waverley.’

Buy that Great Farnham Newspaper and read it!  

Here at the Waverley Web we want the whole borough to be aware of the Balls Up Of  Blightwells – about to be built on Flood Zone 3 in East Street, Farnham.

 

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Will Farnham soon have an alien in its midst?

 

A SIX LEVEL MULTI-SOREY CAR PARK IN FARNHAM’S ONCE LOVELY MARKET TOWN? BUT DO ITS RESIDENTS GIVE A DAMN? 

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Another nice little earner for Waverley Borough Council?

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Listen to Pottymouth, no we didn’t say Portsmouth!

gonetopottsHere’s a letter we have received at the Waverley Web from Jim Duffy a local architect about… yes you guessed! “The slow motion car crash” about to happen with the ‘Brightwells, Farnham -Retail Investment Risk Assessment’ Not that the one sitting in the Giant Chamber pot will take any notice!

And… listen very carefully to the interview with the BBC! 
We have!  And, Pottymouth says, quite clearly,  that they have just had a Judicial Review and were successful. ..   Let us assure everyone in the borough of Waverley.

There has not been a JR and so she lies – and lies! 

Dear Surrey County Councillors
Please see this link for an interview yesterday with me on BBC Radio Surrey, including a response by Waverley Councillor Julia Potts and a statement by SCC

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p04tllk1 BBC Surrey – Breakfast on BBC Surrey, 17/03/201

Click on the picture of the presenters and a slider appears. Move slider to 1.39:40
In the interview you can hear how narrow but important the focus of my critique is. It is all about the unit shops rather than the restaurants, cinema, food store or housing. These other uses are much less location-sensitive and should be fine. These are my two main concerns:

1.Off-Pitch location
My contention, based on considerable experience and market knowledge, is that this location is completely “off-pitch” for mainstream retail and it can’t be fixed. Ms Potts doesn’t respond at all to this point.

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This isn’t true for retailers who have no re-generation agenda. They simply want the best available shop in the position of highest footfall. This isn’t East Street and never will be. Despite Ms Potts claims, a  new Cinema, restaurants and food store will not provide sufficient new daytime footfall to “anchor” the new comparison-goods unit shops. A smallish scheme, such as this, would only work as a well-connected extension to the existing “prime pitch”. The reality is that the Brightwells site suffers badly from being across a busy traffic junction and in the middle of a secondary shopping area with an existing high vacancy rate.

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2. SCC’s high-risk gamble with public money
Surrey County Council has chosen to invest in a scheme that has been passed over for 15 years by all the top industry investors. Doesn’t this fact alone tell you this is unwise and carries a very high risk? Its desire to invest in Surrey towns is laudable but not by taking on an un-viable scheme that the market has so firmly rejected?

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It seems that over 70% of the rent that is required to support the £30m commercial investment is dependent on letting the unit shops to leading multiples at very high rental levels, relative to the adjacent East Street pitch. When this doesn’t happen the value of the investment will plummet by at least this percentage.
The normal practice for such investments is for the developer to take the up-front risk. He does need to secure the end investor in principle. This enables the developer to obtain bank finance to build and let the scheme. However,the long-term investor gets a ready-made income on long leases – at or close to 100% let . The investor has a monitoring role during construction but doesn’t pay anything until letting is finalized.

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According to press reports, only 30% of the space needs to be let before the investment goes final. Apparently this threshold has already been reached with the Cinema, Restaurants and Food Store. This strongly suggests that SCC will have to make a full commitment to the investment with not a single unit shop let. Its development partners will be relatively secure but SCC is  therefore taking a huge gamble with public money!

With a new retail development, where retailers “hunt in packs”, it is pretty well all or nothing. I think the chances of leading retailers agreeing en-mass to go here are close to zero. My prediction is that it will open with twenty-two empty units with hoardings. This is going to be a big problem.
Councillors. Please pause now until you have a full understanding of these issues. You seem to be sleep-walking into a financial disaster. Nothing can now stop you but your own good judgement.
I’ve sent a similar e-mail to Waverley Borough Councillors.

Kind regards
Jim Duffy
Director

jduffy@addarchitects.co.uk