The Investor’s Guide to the Gateway It is estimated that Thames Gateway will boost the UK economy by more than £12 billion each year and create a joined up region that links , and to the global city of . Foreword by Yvette Cooper, Minister for Housing and Planning

The Thames Gateway is a great place to invest, live and work, it has many investment advantages that include 1.5million people living in thriving local communities, and extensive land holdings for new jobs and homes. It has a unique position between London and Europe and is served by two airports, two international rail stations and will be served by when it’s completed in 2017.

The Gateway is Western Europe’s largest investment and regeneration project and offers huge benefits for businesses moving and growing here. Many key sectors invest in Thames Gateway ranging from business and financial services, ports and logistics to advanced manufacturing.

The 2012 Olympic Games will create a heritage, culture and sporting legacy. It is a place of great potential. The UK is the most successful inward investment location within Europe and Thames Gateway offers a new range of investment opportunities in the UK. Come and see what the Thames Gateway can offer.

Contents

WHAT IS THE THAMES GATEWAY? 3 THE FOUNDATIONS FOR A ROBUST ECONOMY 4 SIX DOMINANT SECTORS 6 MAP: NEW JOBS, SKILLS AND TRANSPORT 8–9 GROWING AND EXPANDING BUSINESS 13 FINANCIAL INVESTMENT OPPORTUNITIES 15 THE INVEST IN THAMES GATEWAY TEAM 16

1 2 THE INVESTOR’S GUIDE TO THE GATEWAY www.thamesgateway.gov.uk What is Thames Gateway?

The Thames Gateway stretches for 40 the communities in the Gateway, we miles along the from will achieve: the to Southend in G 160,000 new homes of all tenures Essex and Sheerness in Kent. G At least 225,000 new jobs in a Covering approximately 100,000 growing economy hectares it takes in parts of South G New training opportunities and Essex, North Kent, Medway and East apprenticeships for 250,000 people London. This uniquely defined region offers the UK an opportunity to G An enhanced natural and urban expand the global and environment add more than £12 billion to the UK G A new regional approach to dealing economy each year. with the effects of climate change

Three driving forces are defined in our The conditions and programme vision for Thames Gateway: nurture a management structure required to strong economy; improve the quality of deliver this hugely ambitious project life for local communities; and, develop are in place. Cross Government the Gateway as an eco-region. investment of more than £9 billion over the next three years is defined in the Through the Thames Gateway Delivery Delivery Plan. This investment, Plan, government has set a series of together with new programme major targets for the region, which will management structure will allow help public and private sector people and organisations looking to organisations work together to deliver develop, relocate, expand and invest this vision. By 2016 and by working to find what they’re looking for in the across all tiers of government and with Gateway.

t: +44 (0) 20 7944 6633 f: +44 (0) 20 7944 2151 e: [email protected] 3 The foundations for a robust economy

Four transformational locations have support to new high skilled jobs. It will been identified in Thames Gateway add at least £20 billion a year to the that, because of their size and UK economy. strategic locations, will become the Gateway’s primary economic centres. and the 2012 Olympic Park Regeneration was at the heart of The global finance centre at Canary London’s bid for the 2012 Olympic Wharf is the Gateway’s foremost and Paralympic Games and remains economic driver, with its financial and one of the core objectives of hosting business services employing 90,000 the Games. The decision to build the people. Up to 118,000 more jobs will Olympic Park in Stratford makes it one be provided there on four key sites, of the major focal points for including in a new 280,000 m2 regeneration and development. The £4 commercial and retail scheme billion redevelopment at Stratford City designed by Richard Rogers is the UK’s largest ever retail-led, Partnership accommodating 10,000 mixed-use urban regeneration project. jobs. Canary Wharf has excellent It will confirm Stratford’s position as transport connections through the ’s second largest growing London City Airport, the commercial centre and provide new Jubilee Line and Docklands Light retail, office and leisure facilities, Railway. creating 5,000 new jobs by 2016, and eventually up to 20,000 new jobs. Now that decisions have been taken this year on a funding plan and the The local population will benefit from final route, we expect Crossrail to be the Olympic Village and Stratford City, completed in 2017. This £16 billion which will deliver up to 9,000 new investment will increase rail capacity to homes, over 30% of which will be Canary Wharf by 54%, giving crucial affordable. These will be supported by 4 THE INVESTOR’S GUIDE TO THE GATEWAY www.thamesgateway.gov.uk community facilities and schools, as and the well as new public squares, parks and Gateway’s Ports Cluster natural ecological habitats, developed In May 2007, planning permission was around the international high-speed rail granted for the regeneration of London station which is opening in time for the Gateway at Shellhaven – a 1,500 acre 2012 Olympics. former oil refinery site – to provide the largest deep-water port in Europe. The project will provide much-needed extra Ebbsfleet Valley is a new community deep-sea port capacity, handling even for work and living, being built on the biggest container ships, and brownfield sites around the new enabling the UK to regain its position Ebbsfleet International rail station on as the European centre of maritime the line. International trade. It will have a dramatic effect on trains to Paris and Brussels began distribution within Britain by providing operating from Ebbsfleet in November shorter, more sustainable routes by 2007, at the same time as St Pancras road and new opportunities for longer- was opened. From 2009, high speed range distribution by sea. domestic services will enable local people to reach St Pancras in just The London Gateway also includes seventeen minutes – and the Stratford one of Europe’s largest business and Olympic site in ten minutes. This will logistics parks. Its location beside the transform Kent Thameside as a port provides a unique opportunity to location for homes and jobs. Ebbsfleet establish an integrated supply chain is planned as a major centre for with road, rail and sea connections. business and service employment, The first tenants are expected to move with over half a million square metres in during 2008. The £1.5 billion of new office accommodation. This is investment by owners DP World, the predicted to bring 10,000 new jobs to second largest ever inward investment the area by 2016. into the UK, will create up to 14,000 new jobs by 2025.

t: +44 (0) 20 7944 6633 f: +44 (0) 20 7944 2151 e: [email protected] 5 Six dominant sectors

These areas will be the focus for Through the new international high investment in the short to medium speed rail links, Ebbsfleet Valley and term. Stratford both offer opportunities for major new office developments for Business and Financial both primary and back-office business Services and financial services. The City of London is the acknowledged world finance capital, Urban Environmental and Thames Gateway's excellent links Innovation to make it an ideal The new challenge for the Gateway is location for companies involved with to combine increasing economic the financial services industry. The growth, development and prosperity fastest growing employment location with tackling climate change. The sheer in the UK, Canary Wharf, has in the scale of development underway means last 20 years become a location of it is a great location to pioneer the new world leading pre-eminence for environmental technologies and multinationals. Excellent locations, approaches of the future. Local outstanding infrastructure and access Regeneration Partnerships within the to a skilled workforce all play a role in Gateway have environmental concerns its continued success. high on their agenda. With the sector set to grow by 45% by 2015, the Whilst London Thames Gateway Thames Gateway can lead the way provides a unique location for with environmental jobs, greater use of wholesale finance and global renewables and new technologies, and headquarters, parts of Kent and Essex environmental improvements to existing could provide attractive business homes and buildings – truly becoming infrastructure for non-headquarter an eco-region for the rest of the functions at a relatively lower cost. country and other countries to follow.

6 THE INVESTOR’S GUIDE TO THE GATEWAY www.thamesgateway.gov.uk Port and Logistics In the future, the area also faces major The Thames Gateway has been at the challenges in a rapidly changing global centre of a global transportation and economic landscape. The Gateway trade network since Roman times. can, however, seize opportunities from Today, the cluster of ports in the new development and build on its Gateway includes the new London largely nascent comparative advantage Gateway in , Tilbury, in an international market. This will be Sheerness, Medway, Thamesport and underpinned by innovation, enterprise, over 70 other smaller wharves. skills, and infrastructure investment. Currently the Thames Gateway port cluster represents 18 percent of total Construction UK port capacity (555 million tonnes Plans for the 2012 Olympic Games, in 2005). and the huge building programme for the Thames Gateway, have resulted in The London Gateway Port will see the one the largest construction and conversion of a former fuel refinery into redevelopment projects in the UK, and a deep-sea container port presenting a possibly the whole of Europe; the huge potential for jobs growth and an growth is anticipated to continue for excellent opportunity to complement the next three decades. This and other the other existing port facilities. The jobs associated with the Olympics will £1.5 billion investment by DP World at boost the labour market in 2012, with London Gateway will add a further the legacy of the Games leaving a 10% to the total UK capacity when positive impression on the local labour complete. The net effect on market. With its vision of excellence in employment in the Essex Thames design, and its high environmental Gateway will be substantial. standards, the Thames Gateway will also lead the way in technologies and Advanced Manufacturing methods of construction in the UK. The Thames Gateway has a long history in pioneering cutting edge Creative Industries technologies in a wide variety of There is much potential to build on the industries, at one time or another existing 16,000 business and 80,000 leading the world in ship building, people employed in the Creative armaments, aeronautics and industries. The Creative Way Lifelong automotive industries. The Thames Learning Network brings education Gateway still leads in defence institutions and funders of institutions technology research, aerospace in the Thames Gateway together to avionics, automotive powerplants and work strategically and with greater bio/life sciences, and is home to a collaboration to bring the skills needed large number of existing investments by this sector into fruition. The from companies that are household expanding number of courses multi-national names. Furthermore the available at the Gateway’s college’s government’s prioritisation of funding and universities, as well as for higher education and skills training Investments such as the Royal Opera will ensure that the Thames Gateway House in , will see the sector will have the necessary skilled continue to grow in importance. employment pool to continue to service these industries in the future. t: +44 (0) 20 7944 6633 f: +44 (0) 20 7944 2151 e: [email protected] 7 Map: New Jobs, Skills and Transport 5

To Shenfield A127

STRATFORD. LOWER LEA AND Barking

St Pancras A13 To Heathrow and Maidenhead

GREENWICH PENINSULA THURROCK AND WOOLWICH Erith

London KENT THAMESIDE

Sector Skills Academies HE / FE and Vocational Training Enterprise Hubs Crossrail

High Speed 1 North Kent Motorway Primary route Population density - persons per hectare (source: Census of Population, 2001, ONS) 0 - 50 50 - 100 more than 100

The Thames Gateway Boundary 0

Facts about Thames Gateway G The region covers 100,000 hectares G Government has already invested £7 billion between 2003 and 2008 G Approximately 1.45 million people already live in the area G There are 600,000 households and 32,000 VAT registered businesses G Over a third of the population is qualified to degree or NVQ4 level G There are 637,000 people employed and over 300,000 foreign language speakers G The Gateway has 19 universities and 11 higher education colleges G There are two business airports in the Gateway: London City in Docklands and Southend in South Essex.

8 THE INVESTOR’S GUIDE TO THE GATEWAY www.thamesgateway.gov.uk South Essex

Southend

MEDWAY

Sittingbourne and Swale

A2

To Pari s, B an ru d L ss ille els

5Kilometres10 © Crown copyright

G Crossrail will be built – opening 2017 G Ebbsfleet to Paris in 2h 17 minutes by train. From 2009 Ebbsfleet to St Pancras in 17 minutes by train G 20% of UK can be reached by road from the Thames Gateway in 2 hours G North Kent’s service has won a National Transport Award G London Gateway will handle 3.5 million containers per year and will have 800,000 sqm of warehousing available G Kent Science Park in Swale was voted most enterprising location in the South East in 2006

t: +44 (0) 20 7944 6633 f: +44 (0) 20 7944 2151 e: [email protected] 9 Development Opportunities

A number of sectors are expected to Housing Developers flourish in the Gateway over the next The Thames Gateway will build ten years. In order to support this 160,000 new homes by 2016, growth, government is investing in 108,000 of these will be in the training and skills for local communities Gateway’s top ten sites. The Gateway to prepare them for work in these six expects these dwellings to sectors. demonstrate excellence in both design and in the materials used, to be Master plans for the largest brownfield supported by full range of community sites in the Gateway like the site at facilities, and be affordable to wide , Greenwich range of people. Peninsula and Ebbsfleet Valley have already been defined. However, a huge Commercial Property number of development opportunities Developers still exist. The Thames Gateway is creating the conditions for 225,000 new jobs. 10 THE INVESTOR’S GUIDE TO THE GATEWAY www.thamesgateway.gov.uk This combined with the efforts being commercial, leisure and retail made to attract new companies to the opportunities will be incorporated to Gateway means that there will be a create sustainable town centre, and demand for additional commercial encourage future investment. properties. These will need to be in a wide range of types from large Entertainment and Leisure warehouses at the Gateway’s logistic The Gateway has great potential as a hubs to small incubator and innovation tourist destination through its cultural units. With approximately 3,000 and historical offer. It also has a major hectares of brownfield land available natural asset to build on in the form of across the Gateway, opportunities the . The Gateway is also abound around for companies needing growing in importance as an the space to build. entertainment and leisure destination. AEG Europe’s new O2 entertainment Town Centre Regeneration complex on the , Whilst the development of new and the development of historic housing and new communities has an dockyard of Chatham and the Dickens important role in the Thames Gateway World attraction are just a few programme, improving the quality of examples of successes to date. With life for those in the Gateway’s existing the additional opportunities that will communities is equally important. come from hosting the 2012 Therefore 14 Gateway town centres Olympics, the entertainment and have now been targeted as priorities leisure sector in the Gateway is set to for future investment. Existing facilities grow enormously. will be improved and additional

Top Ten Housing Sites 14 Priority Town Centres Barking Riverside and Town Centre Barking Sittingbourne Basildon Basildon Southend-on-Sea Ebbsfleet Valley Bromley by Bow Stratford Greenwich Peninsula Woolwich Kent Thameside Waterfront Erith Medway Waterfront and Chattenden The Royals and Canning Town Grays Thurrock Medway Woolwich Purfleet t: +44 (0) 20 7944 6633 f: +44 (0) 20 7944 2151 e: [email protected] 11 12 THE INVESTOR’S GUIDE TO THE GATEWAY www.thamesgateway.gov.uk Growing and Expanding Business

A growing economy brings with it the Government investment in many opportunities for the private education will create a further 9,000 sector. For many businesses being new Gateway graduates a year, close to London as a global city is building on an existing critical mass of essential but expensive. London is skilled personnel. growing east and with new high speed rail links from King’s Cross through the Small and Medium Sized Gateway Paris and Brussels, the Enterprises (SMEs) decision to fund Crossrail and London Of the estimated 600,000 businesses Gateway, the new international in the Gateway at present, the vast container port in Thurrock, Thames majority of these fall into the SME Gateway offers a new unique category, and the Gateway has a international investment proposition. strong offer to companies of this size. The Gateway’s competitive cost base Organisations of all sizes are already and the wide range of locations on moving to the area, confident in the offer means that finding a suitable site knowledge that making a commitment is never likely to be an issue. The to the area today means they can play Government is also investing 1.6 billion a part in shaping the future of the in teaching and learning to provide communities they move to. The additional opportunities for further network of Local Delivery Vehicles in education and work-based learning the Gateway brings together public between 2008 and 2011 ensuring that and private sector partners to ensure potential employees with the all voices and needs are considered Gateway’s Regional Development before money is spent. Agencies, and their sub regional partners, companies will also be able Multinational Companies to access free and confidential Because of its excellent national and business advise on future growth international transport links, the opportunities. Thames Gateway is becoming increasingly attractive to companies New Businesses looking for a UK or EU Headquarters. If you want to start a business, the Canary Wharf has been particularly Gateway is the place to do it. Business successful in the respect, attracting the incubator space is becoming likes of HSBC, Lehman Brothers and increasing availability to support new Wells Fargo to name but a few. This companies. More are planned on or success is expected to extend near Gateway University campuses to eastwards into the wider Gateway. ensure maximum benefits. Companies There are plenty of suitable properties will also have access to the combined either built or in planning, and more resources of the business advisors than enough space for further from the Gateway’s three regional development. Recruitment of staff with development agencies and their sub the necessary skills will also be regional partners. straightforward – the Thames Gateway has 300,000 multi-lingual people, and

t: +44 (0) 20 7944 6633 f: +44 (0) 20 7944 2151 e: [email protected] 13 14 THE INVESTOR’S GUIDE TO THE GATEWAY www.thamesgateway.gov.uk Financial Investment Opportunities

Over the next ten years it is expected term ambitions. The new Economic that £43 billion of private sector money Investment and Development Plan that will be invested in Thames Gateway. A is due to be published in 2008 by the large portion of that money is expected three Regional Development Agencies to come from the City. in the Greater South East, will provide more detail of the long term economic Government’s commitment to ambitions. delivering Thames Gateway gives fund managers and venture capitalists a The Invest in Thames Gateway Team reassurance not found in other parts of has been established as part of the country. Investing in land, Government’s Thames Gateway developments organisations and Executive. Positioned as an impartial initiatives in this region provides a and informed voice, this team of lesser risk than equivalent opportunities investment experts will help investors elsewhere. However, due to the scale understand and navigate the complex of regeneration and business growth in structures that exist in the Gateway. the Gateway, it is often hard to truly assess all of the investment Once the investment opportunity has opportunities that are available. been selected and an agreement is in place, the Invest in Thames Gateway The Thames Gateway Delivery Plan Team will be able to provide accurate sets out Government’s spending over area and location analysis and updates the next three years, which itself on the status of the development or provide the investment community to initiative if it is required. an understanding of the area’s short

t: +44 (0) 20 7944 6633 f: +44 (0) 20 7944 2151 e: [email protected] 15 The Invest in Thames Gateway Team The Government’s Thames Gateway Executive and the Regional Development Agencies are establishing a single unit to help potential investors. Meanwhile we have established a single contact number for all enquiries:

Contact Information Thames Gateway Executive c/o Communities & Local Government 10th Floor, 2 Exchange Tower Harbour Exchange Square London, E14 9GE t: + 44 (0) 207 944 6633 f: + 44 (0) 207 944 2151 e: [email protected]

16 Department for Communities and Local Government Eland House Bressenden Place London SW1E 5DU Telephone: 020 7944 4400 Website: www.communities.gov.uk

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November 2007

Product Code: 07 TGDU 04859I This publication provides potential investors with a brief overview of the economic ambitions for the Gateway. It also sets out details of the support service offered by the Invest in Thames Gateway Team, which is part of Government’s Thames Gateway Executive. This document is an accompaniment to the Thames Gateway Delivery Plan.