New hope for disused sites

Keyland Developments plans to expand its business interests by working with landowners to create developments that will meet the growing demand for houses and industrial space. Keyland, which is a sister company of Yorkshire Water and a subsidiary of the Kelda Group, plans to offer its services to landowners across the North.

Bradford-based Keyland has been operating across Yorkshire for more than 20 years, regenerating Yorkshire Water’s redundant sites. The company has an 800 acre land bank and a further 900 acres are held in joint venture partnerships. The development pipeline includes more than 6,000 residential units and around six million sq ft of commercial space. Since 2012 the team has submitted 28 planning applications.

Until now, Keyland has only worked on disused Yorkshire Water sites, but the company wants to broaden the range of potential opportunities.

A spokesman said: “In a new move, the team is currently in discussions with representatives of a number of major landowners with interests in the North of England with a view to extending its service to them and bringing forward development on strategic sites across the region.

“In the new approach, Keyland will assemble a team for each project to promote the site through the planning system, address development issues, conduct a marketing campaign and negotiate sale contracts.”

Peter Garrett, the managing director of Keyland Developments, said that the £15m turnover firm “worked at the front end of cradle to grave development”.

He added; “Over many years we have developed a successful formula for maximising the value of strategic, and often very complex, sites and the next natural step is for us to seek to extend this reach beyond Yorkshire Water’s portfolio.

“Through working with regional landowners, we hope to bring about the revival of strategic sites which have the potential to make significant regeneration contributions but have lain dormant.

“Often complexities involved with planning, legal and title issues, access or ground issues, contract negotiations and sales strategies create barriers to development but our expertise lies in overcoming these challenges.

“We also believe that there is a market for our services from major corporates, who may have a cautious development approach and will value our experience of working within an organisation with a reputation worth protecting.

“It is incredibly exciting to be in a position where we can actively discuss opportunities to work in partnership with the region’s landowners to revive development across the north of the country.”

Keyland is working on a high profile scheme in West Yorkshire.

Last month, Aire Valley Land, a joint venture between Evans Property Group and Keyland Developments, started work on a £7.5m infrastructure programme at the 165-acre Temple Green site in Leeds.

The site, which is the largest of four development sites in the Leeds Enterprise Zone, has planning permission for more than three million sq ft of developed space at Junction 45 of the M1.