Cornwall Employment Land Review Final Report November 2010 © Nathaniel Lichfield & Partners Ltd 2010. Trading as Nathaniel Lichfield and Partners. All Rights Reserved. Registered Office: 14 Regent's Wharf All Saints Street London N1 9RL All plans within this document produced by NLP are based upon Ordnance Survey mapping with the permission of Her Majesty’s Stationery Office. © Crown Copyright reserved. Licence number AL50684A Cornwall Council: Employment Land Review Contents 1.0 Executive Summary 1 2.0 Introduction 9 3.0 Policy Context 15 4.0 Economic Overview 21 5.0 The Commercial Property Market 39 6.0 Future Economic Drivers 55 7.0 Assessment of Employment Sites 67 8.0 Future Employment Space Requirements 89 9.0 Demand and Supply Balance 109 10.0 The Non B Class Sectors 122 11.0 Strategy and Delivery Implications 139 12.0 Developing a Monitoring Framework 151 13.0 Conclusions and Recommendations 159 1428378v4 Cornwall Council: Employment Land Review Figures Figure 2.1 Study Methodology 11 Figure 2.2 Map of TTWAs and Former Local Authority Areas within Cornwall 12 Figure 4.1 Total employment and growth rates in TTWAs 22 Figure 4.2 Growth in employment by sector, 1998-2008 23 Figure 4.3 Location Quotients of Key Sectors 23 Figure 4.4 Proportion of business ‘units’ (companies and branches) by size band (number of employees) 25 Figure 4.5 Average Annual Business Start-up Rates 2004-8 per 10,000 of working-age population 25 Figure 4.6 5-year survival rate for new businesses 2003-2008 26 Figure 4.7 Claimant unemployment, 2006-2009 27 Figure 4.8 Neighbourhoods with Highest Levels of Worklessness (25% of working-age residents claiming benefits) 28 Figure 4.9 Skill levels of the working-age population 29 Figure 4.10 Median weekly wages 29 Figure 4.11 Population/Employment Balance in Main Towns 30 Figure 4.12 Commuting Flows, 2001 31 Figure 5.1 Amount of B-class floorspace by Middle Layer Super Output Area 41 Figure 5.2 Change in Stock of B-class Space 41 Figure 5.3 Age of Premises in Cornwall Compared with the South West Average 43 Figure 5.4 Overview of Property Enquiries 2008/09 44 Figure 6.1 Future Economic Drivers 55 Figure 8.1 Methodology for Assessing Future Land Requirements 90 Figure 8.2 Baseline forecast for B-class employment change by TTWA, 2008-2026 93 Figure 8.3 Forecast B Class Employment Change for Cornwall by TTWA 2009-2026 based on Past Trends 96 Figure 8.4 Employment Change 2009-2026 based on Past Take-up Rates 97 Figure 8.5 Proportion of Homeworkers, 2001 102 Figure 8.6 Total B-class employment levels under different growth scenarios 103 Figure 8.7 Change in B-class Employment by Scenario, 2009-2026 104 Figure 10.1 Location Quotient/Job Growth of Cornwall Sectors 124 Figure 10.2 Non-B Employment Growth by TTWA 136 Tables Table 1.1 Net additional land requirements under the preferred planning scenario 4 Table 1.2 Demand/Supply Balance for Office and Industrial Land in Cornwalls TTWAs 6 Table 2.1 B-class Employment Land Definitions 10 1428378v4 Cornwall Council: Employment Land Review Table 2.2 'Best fit' of former local authority areas to TTWAs and main settlements 13 Table 3.1 Strategic Issues for Delivery 17 Table 3.2 Schedule of Policy and Evidence Base Documents 18 Table 4.1 Proportion of knowledge-based industries 24 Table 4.2 Overview of TTWA Economic Conditions 36 Table 4.3 SWOT analysis for Cornwall’s Economy 38 Table 5.1 Rents and Vacancy for Commercial Property by Former District Area, 2009 49 Table 5.2 Summary of Market Strength by Location/Sector 50 Table 6.1 Overview of Key SIF Workspace Projects 62 Table 7.1 Sample of Sites visited by NLP 67 Table 7.2 Distribution of Total Assessed Employment Land by TTWA 68 Table 7.3 Employment Land Supply by Quality 72 Table 7.4 Undeveloped Sites in Bude TTWA 76 Table 7.5 Undeveloped Sites in Falmouth & Helston TTWA 76 Table 7.6 Undeveloped Sites in Launceston TTWA 77 Table 7.7 Undeveloped Sites in Penzance TTWA 78 Table 7.8 Undeveloped Sites in Saltash & Torpoint TTWA 79 Table 7.9 Undeveloped Sites in St Austell TTWA 80 Table 7.10 Undeveloped Sites in the Truro, Camborne & Redruth TTWA 82 Table 7.11 Undeveloped Sites in the Wadebridge TTWA 83 Table 7.12 Undeveloped Land Supply by TTWA and Type 83 Table 7.13 Undeveloped Land by Development Type 84 Table 7.14 Undeveloped Land Supply by TTWA and delivery timescale (ha) 84 Table 7.15 Worst-case Supply Scenario 85 Table 8.1 Future Scenarios Description 90 Table 8.2 Forecast Employment Change in Cornwall 2009-2026 91 Table 8.3 Baseline Job Forecast based Employment Space Requirements, 2009-2026 94 Table 8.4 Forecast Employment Change in Cornwall 2009-2026 based on Past Employment Trends 95 Table 8.5 Past Trends based Employment Space Requirements, 2009-2026 96 Table 8.6 VOA data based Employment Space Requirements, 2009-2026 98 Table 8.7 Forecast Employment Change in Cornwall 2009-2026 Based on Labour Supply 99 Table 8.8 Forecast Employment change Based on Labour Supply (Population & Housing Growth Options) 2009-2026 99 Table 8.9 Labour Supply based Employment Space Requirements, 2009-2026 100 Table 8.10 Growth Scenario Options 103 Table 8.11 Comparison of Employment Land Requirements by Scenario 104 Table 8.12 Gross Employment Floorspace Requirements 2009-2026 106 Table 8.13 Gross Employment Land Requirements, 2009-2026 106 Table 8.14 Gross Employment Land Requirements, 2009-2026 108 P2 1428378v4 Cornwall Council: Employment Land Review Table 9.1 Demand/Supply for Employment Land by TTWA 2009-2026 109 Table 9.2 Demand/Supply for Employment Land by TTWA 2009-26 110 Table 9.3 Demand/Supply for Office Employment Land by TTWA 2009/2026 110 Table 9.4 Demand/Supply for Industrial Employment Land by TTWA 2009/2026 111 Table 9.5 Demand/Supply Balance by TTWA to 2026 112 Table 9.6 Demand/Supply Balance assuming "worst-case" supply 114 Table 9.7 Five year demand/supply balance by type of space and TTWA 116 Table 10.1 Cornwall's Changing Population Structure 123 Table 10.2 Retail Centres in Cornwall and the South West 125 Table 10.3 Future Space Requirements of Non-B Class Sectors 136 Table 12.1 Employment Land Monitoring in Cornwall in 2006/7 152 Table 12.2 Employment Land Monitoring in Cornwall, 2008-09 153 Table 13.1 Net additional land requirements under the preferred planning scenario 162 Table 13.2 Demand/Supply Balance for Office and Industrial Land in Cornwalls TTWAs 164 1428378v4 Cornwall Council: Employment Land Review Appendices 1 Appendix 1 List of Consultees Appendix 2 Business Survey Appendix 3 Cornwall Council Site Assessments and Site Ranking Tables Appendix 4 NLP Site Assessments of Undeveloped Sites Appendix 5 Employment Forecasts Appendix 6 Categorisation on B-Class and Non-B Class Employment 1428378v4 Cornwall Council: Employment Land Review 1.0 Executive Summary 1.1 Nathaniel Lichfield and Partners (NLP) was appointed by Cornwall Council to undertake an Employment Land Review (ELR) as part of the evidence base to inform the preparation of the Local Development Framework (LDF) and the allocation of land for employment uses. 1.2 The purpose of this study is to provide evidence to support the development of the LDF. It is not a policy or strategy document per se, but instead provides analysis of some of the key employment land issues across Cornwall prior to specific planning or economic development policies being developed. It aims to look across the LDF plan period to 2026 at a strategic level, and more detailed local issues will need to be examined through supplementary evidence base studies. 1.3 The following key messages can be drawn from this study: 1. Cornwall has experienced high rates of economic and employment growth over the last decade, although some structural problems remain and future growth may be constrained by public sector spending cuts 1.4 Cornwall comprises a large rural area, with a polycentric network of relatively small settlements. The county’s economy has been shaped by its geographic peripherality. However, the last decade has been one of significant economic growth with high rates of job and company formation and with unemployment having fallen to significantly below the regional and national rates. Furthermore, so far, Cornwall appears to have weathered the immediate impact of the recession better than other parts of the UK. 1.5 However, wages remain very low, there is seasonal dependence on low-skilled jobs, a relatively low proportion of businesses are knowledge-based, and a high proportion of employment is part-time. Going forward, public sector funding will become more constrained in the short to medium-term, and Convergence funding will end in 2013. Both of these may impact to some extent on future economic growth. 2. Industrial demand is primarily driven by proximately to the A30 whilst office demand is highest in Truro, although there are also significant levels of latent demand across the county 1.6 Demand for employment space in Cornwall tends to be relatively local and the requirements are generally small-scale in nature. Most office stock is found in Truro although industrial is more evenly spread around the County, albeit that the A30 is a major driver of demand. Although the stock of floorspace has increased in recent years, the amount of privately-funded speculative development has been extremely small and almost exclusively confined to the office market in Truro.