Plymouth’s Sutton Harbour Group Plc is aiming to raise £3.5m from its shareholders to fund development projects at the city’s former airport site and on the waterfront where work will start this summer on a nine-story block of flats.
Construction is due to start “imminently” on the 14-apratment Harbour Arch Quay tower at Sutton Harbour. Work was due to begin in 2020 but it was delayed by the Covid pandemic, but now Sutton Harbour Group insists construction is about to commence.
It is also progressing plans for further skyscrapers on the waterfront, including the 21-storey Sugar Quay Tower and two other developments of 16 and 13 floors.
And it also claims to have “ready proposals” for the 113-acre ex-airport site, at Derriford in the north of the city, which has been unused, apart from as storage, for nearly 10 years.
More Sutton Harbour Group news… £2m land purchase £110m apartments plan Events pontoons approval Council eyes airportTo fund some of this work, the AIM-listed company has written to existing shareholders offering more shares with the intention of raising £3.5m before its annual meeting on July 30, 2021.
The group’s newly published results, for the year to the end of March 2021, said: “To support the completion of the Harbour Arch Quay development, provide headroom to invest in other strategic sites and support the costs of planning and professional fees the group accordingly intends to make an open offer for new equity capital to enable existing shareholders to participate in future growth of the group in the near future.”
As regards the former airport land, given a five-year protection from development in the 2019 Joint Local Plan, the report only states: “The site is safeguarded from development until 2024. The group has ready proposals for a deliverable alternative use of the 113 acre site which meet the social and economic needs of Plymouth.”
But Sutton Harbour Group is free to make progress at the waterfront, on land it owns. It has been planning the Harbour Arch Quay block since 2017 and now wants to start work.
The firm’s annual results document said: “The first new development project at Sutton Harbour in a decade, Harbour Arch Quay, due to start on site imminently.”
It added: “The group has made significant progress with its stated regeneration business plans. After further delays resulting from the Covid crisis disruption, construction of the 14-apartment building known as Harbour Arch Quay is due to start this summer.”
The report to investors said the building is due for completion in just a year’s time and gave details of how it will be paid for, saying: “Since the year end the group has arranged separate development financing, which is subject to completion, to fund the Harbour Arch Quay scheme. Marketing of the 14 high quality waterfront apartments will soon be underway with good levels of informal interest already reported.”
Meanwhile, the report also confirmed that in December 2020 the company completed the purchase of a site just east of the Harbour, on Sutton Road, and immediately submitted an application for two residential-led developments on this site.
These are the Sutton Road East and St John’s Bridge developments, two residential schemes of 16 and 13 floors respectively split between six separate blocks, with a combined cost of £50m.
Sutton Harbour Group now plans to start work on the first of these buildings in the middle of next year, and its report said: “The group is working diligently with the local authority on the finalisation of planning applications for the two buildings on the Sutton Road site. The group is hopeful of a start on site with the first of the Sutton Road developments in Summer 2022.”
The annual results revealed Sutton Harbour Group had made a £2m loss, but that this was mainly due to Covid and lockdown issues, and it was expected that finances would recover.
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To provide “additional headroom” and assure “financial resilience” through the post-lockdown recovery period, the firm increased its bank facility by £2m above the core £25m available with National Westminster Bank plc until May 2022.
Its net debt increased to £26.874m from £23.549m during the year, an increase of £3.325m of which £2.275m was a loan taken out in December 2020 to finance the purchase of the site on Sutton Road.
In the past, Sutton Harbour Group has said that once it has built the Sutton Road East and St John’s Bridge developments it will look at creating a 20-storey Sugar Quay skyscraper, next to them but right on the waterside.
Philip Beinhaker, Sutton Harbour Group executive chairman, said: “The group has used the last year to advance the development projects, invest in a new development site and develop the marketing and operations efficiencies of the marinas business.
“The group now wishes to continue its pace of progress. To support the completion of the Harbour Arch Quay development, provide headroom to invest in other strategic sites and support the costs of planning and professional fees the group accordingly intends to make an open offer for new equity capital to enable existing shareholders to participate in future growth of the Group in the near future.”
