Prologis buys land in southeast England for spec development

Industrial property giant Prologis has acquired about 12 hectares of industrial development land in the English market town of Dunstable.

The purchase is Prologis' first land acquisition in the southeast of England since 2007. 'The transaction is an important step towards Prologis' goal of providing the best customer opportunities in London and the South East,' the company said in a statement. Financial details were not disclosed.

The vendor was ICP Asset Management.

The new site, which is close to the existing Prologis Park Dunstable, already has planning consent for a 70,000 m² unit. However, in line with market demand on the southern M1 corridor, Prologis will shortly be submitting a new planning application to Central Bedfordshire Council for two distribution units of 28,000 m² and 33,400 m². Both buildings, which may be built speculatively, have been designed to achieve BREEAM 2011 'very good' accreditation and the best Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) rating possible for their size.

Andrew Griffiths, managing director of Prologis UK, said: 'There is a shortage of new facilities in this size range in the South East market and we are pleased to have secured a deliverable site on the M1 corridor, which we anticipate will be of great interest to our customer base. We will make a decision on speculative development once the revised planning application has been approved. Our decision will also be subject to ongoing pre-let discussions.'

Prologis had about 1.7 million m² completed and under development in the UK, as well as over 435 hectares of land available for future development.