Vauxhall Motors will kick off the season with a trip to Corby Town - wirralnews.co.uk
London's Shard tower opens with empty floors, flat rents - Reuters
LONDON |
LONDON (Reuters) - Superstar architect Rienzo Piano calls the European Union's new tallest building a "vertical city", but when his stunning Shard tower opens on Thursday over London Bridge it will house the equivalent of a whole vacant neighborhood.
The elongated glass pyramid, built atop a train station in a scruffy neighborhood near the Thames, will open with 26 floors of vacant office space, and developers have to fill it at a time when rents are at the flattest in at least 50 years.
The Shard's developers are spared from market wrath solely because the building was built with funding by the deep-pocketed royal family of Qatar, rather than a publicly listed firm, said John Cahill, a property analyst at Investec.
"With the Shard's office floors still empty, it would be panic stations if it was a listed developer behind it," he said.
Long gone are the days in London's commercial real estate market when the Foster + Parners-designed 30 St Mary Axe, known as "the Gherkin" because of its oblong shape, opened in the financial district in April 2004 with all floors already let.
The Shard is just one of several skyscrapers now sprouting across London with nicknames that reflect the silhouettes they cast on the skyline. But with a financial crisis having blown in since architects first came up with designs for the "Walkie Talkie" and the "Cheese Grater", lettings have been muted.
Rents for the best offices in London's financial district - the yardstick used by Shard developer Irvine Sellar for the offices at the bottom of the tower - have been 55 pounds per square foot since September 2010, property consultant CBRE said. That is the longest period of flat rents since its records began in 1960.
"The only reason rents haven't started to fall is the relatively low level of available space at the moment," said Kevin McCauley, head of central London research at CBRE, who expects rents to remain flat for the rest of the year.
The Walkie-Talkie, also known as 20 Fenchurch Street, is being developed by Land Securities and Canary Wharf Group. The Leadenhall tower - the official name of the Cheese Grater - is being funded by British Land and the property arm the Ontario, Canada city workers' retirement fund.
NEW MODEL
Developers say a wave of lease breaks and expiries over the next several years will prompt tenants to move into well-appointed new offices.
"Why would you drive around in a 1970s car when you can have a 2012 model?" said Sellar, an entrepreneur who began his career with a clothing store on London's Carnaby Street.
So far, it hasn't worked out that way. Work has halted at the Pinnacle skyscraper on Bishopsgate, which will remain a stump in the ground until a major slice is let. And developers of a neighboring tower at 100 Bishopsgate say they will only begin once a large tenant is signed up.
If the climate is bothering the Qatari funders of the Shard, they did not say so at an opening event on Wednesday.
"Recovering our investment is a minor thing at the moment," said Sheikh Abdullah Bin Saoud Al Thani, governor of Qatar Central Bank.
The development cost of the Shard, a neighboring office building called The Place and communal areas around London Bridge train station is about 1.5 billion pounds ($2.4 billion).
"We have confidence in the London market and a long relationship with London," he said, emphasizing that a slowdown was part of a normal economic cycle.
The only tenant so far is the 195-room Shangri-La hotel, which will occupy floors 34 to 52 of the 87-storey tower. Sellar expects the rest of the building to be fully occupied by the end of 2014, conceding it was a long-term view he could take only because of the Qatari backing.
He will have to lure tenants like media and financial firms to venture to the opposite bank of the Thames from the City, the traditional financial district. He says the Shard's location will save commuters who arrive by train from walking across London bridge in the rain. Others are unconvinced.
"A lot of traditional City tenants refuse to cross the river to even have a look," said Simon Wainwright, managing director of property consultancy J Peiser Wainwright. "In a nutshell it's a bridge too far for many," he said.
Sellar scoffed. "That's absolutely ridiculous... We've been very selective as to who can even come and view the building. Just look up the road at Ernst & Young and PWC and you realize you are in the middle of a financial district."
Discussions are underway with tenants for about a third of the office space, he said.
The Qataris, who also London's Harrods department store and the luxury One Hyde Park apartment scheme in Knightsbridge, are not the only rich foreigners buying into London real estate.
Overseas buyers have invested 15.8 billion pounds in London offices since 2010, 64 percent of the total, CBRE said. Middle Eastern investors accounted for 11 percent, or 2.8 billion pounds. And foreign ownership of the City financial district stands at 52 percent, Development Securities said.
"Clearly the recent appreciation of Sterling has had little effect on overseas investor's views that central London is providing both good value and a safe haven," said Simon Barrowcliff, a CBRE executive director.
But the next wave of investors do not appear to be putting so much money into skyscrapers. Ken Shuttleworth, the architect who led the team behind the Gherkin while at Foster + Partners, said no plans for London skyscrapers were crossing his desk.
"In the current economic climate, we are basically only working on skyscrapers in the Far East," he said. ($1 = 0.6378 British pounds)
(Reporting by Tom Bill)
London 2012 Olympics: UK Sport sets a minimum target of 48 medals for Team GB to achieve in Games - Daily Telegraph
UK Sport has handed out more than £500 million in taxpayer and Lottery funding to Olympic sports since London was awarded the Games in 2005, and is hopeful that there will be a greater spread of medal-winning sports than the 11 that were successful in 2008.
Every sport with the exception of football, which UK Sport does not fund, has agreed a target, with 20 of the 28 hoping for at least one medal. In 2008, 14 sports had a minimum target of at least one medal.
Despite the potential greater spread, responsibility for winning the bulk of medals will again rest on the “formula one” sports in which GB excel, cycling, sailing and rowing, plus the ones with most medals on offer, athletics and swimming.
Cycling has a target of six to 10 medals, fewer than the remarkable haul of 14 from Beijing that did more than anything to elevate the British team to fourth in Beijing.
Rowing have a target of six medals having asked to post a specific number rather than a range, and sailing has a range of three to five. Swimming has set a target of five to seven, and athletics five to eight.
Taekwondo, which has controversially left out world number one Aaron Cook, has a target of one to three medals for its four-member team. Tennis has a target of nought to two medals, based almost entirely on Andy Murray’s presence in the singles and doubles draw.
At the other end of the scale badminton, judo, shooting and fencing have an upper target of one medal. Eight sports – basketball, synchronised swimming, table tennis, volleyball, handball, water polo, weightlifting and wrestling – have conceded they would not win a medal and have targets of reaching certain stages of Olympic competition.
London Welsh face Leicester Tigers in Premiership opener - BBC News
Newly promoted London Welsh will host nine-time English champions Leicester Tigers at their new home in Oxford in the opening round of the 2012-13 Premiership season.
Defending champions Harlequins will take on Wasps in the London Double Header curtain raiser at Twickenham.
Saracens face London Irish in the other Twickenham match on 1 September.
Elsewhere new-look Bath travel to Worcester, Gloucester host Northampton and Sale travel to Exeter.
London Welsh, whose participation in the competition was only confirmed at an appeal on Friday, face a testing second match when they face Harlequins at the Stoop.
"We're delighted to draw Leicester and Harlequins, they were by far the best two teams in England last year, and they're arguably in the top half a dozen sides in Europe," Exiles head coach Lyn Jones said.
"The challenge we face against Leicester and Harlequins is as big as London Welsh has ever faced."
Other notable clashes see last season's finalists, Quins and Tigers, meet up at Welford Road over the weekend of 21/22/23 September.
The first West country derby sees Bath travel to Kingsholm to face Nigel Davies's revamped Gloucester in round six (5/6/7 October).
The opening East Midlands derby has Saints travelling to Leicester for the first weekend in November.
The play-off semi-finals are scheduled for 11/12 May, with the final at Twickenham on Saturday 25 May.
A full list of the season's matches can be found on the official Aviva Premiership website.
London 2012: Olympic bonus bus strike 'suspended' - BBC News
A bus strike due to begin on Thursday in a row about Olympic bonuses has been suspended while union officials consider a new offer.
Bus companies have offered a bonus of £583 to drivers working 24 of the 29 days that the Games are on, or £700 for drivers in busy garages.
The conciliation service Acas confirmed the strike has been put on hold following a third day of talks.
The last strike on the issue saw bus services disrupted across the capital.
Some bus companies had taken legal action to prevent workers striking.
But Peter Harwood, Acas chief conciliator, said: "I am pleased to announce the suspension of both the pending court action and tomorrow's strike. Acas talks are continuing."
'No justification'The Unite union wants a bonus for each of its 21,000 members for working during the Games.
Transport for London (TfL) said it will split extra revenue from the Games 50:50 with bus operating companies, on the condition it is passed on to bus staff.
It has offered to have the amount of additional bus fare revenue generated during the Games independently verified.
TfL's managing director for surface transport, Leon Daniels, said: "The offer of additional funds from the bus operating companies and a share of any additional bus fare revenue generated during the Games means there is no justification for further strike action.
"Should Unite insist that the total sum available is offered to all employees at bus operators across London, then this would mean a payment of £583 for every employee of every bus company.
Strike payMembers of the union went on strike last month and were planning a second 24-hour walkout on Thursday.
Unite argues that, as other transport workers are being paid bonuses, the treatment of bus drivers has been unfair.
It is also planning on holding a strike on 24 July, days before the Games begin.
As well as demanding the bonus, the union is also holding out for an extra £100 for every day workers go on strike.
TfL said the strikes were not necessary and said an extra £8.3m had been offered by the mayor but the union had failed to put any offers to its members.
Three firms - London General, Arriva the Shires, and Metroline - obtained a High Court injunction preventing their employees joining the strike on 22 June.
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