SEEDA Chairman visits Hastings economic development programme

Jim Braithwaite and John Shaw view the progress being made on Priory Quarter

Jim Brathwaite CBE, Chairman of the South East England Development Agency (SEEDA), visited Hastings on Thursday 5 June to review the progress of the economic development programme.

Brathwaite is pictured here with Sea Space director John Shaw on the rooftop of the new Lacuna Place offices, inspecting the progress of the building as well as all the development taking place around it in the new Priory Quarter business district and elsewhere across the town.

Providing 36,000 sq of business space, Lacuna Place is the first major new offices to be built in Hastings for 25 years. It will be completed next month and is letting to occupiers now.

Lacuna Place is to be followed closely by the adjoining One Priory Square - a further 46,000 sq ft of offices - and Priory Square as a new public space, both to be completed by early 2009.

After visiting Lacuna Place, Jim Brathwaite was given a tour of the rest of Priory Quarter including University Centre Hastings. He was then taken to the north-west of the town where he visited the thriving Innovation Centre, as well as the Queensway South site where the first of a series of Enviro21 Innovation Parks is to be built.

The Queensway South project gained planning consent last month and is designed to attract companies at the cutting edge of environmental technologies, plus others wanting ‘green’ business premises. It will enable up to 500 jobs to be created. The Queensway South Enviro21 Innovation Park, along with the second Innovation Park planned for 200m away, are being designed with the latest eco-friendly techniques and materials. All electricity for both sites is intended to be generated a wind turbine.

SEEDA is a major public funding partner for the economic development programme for the Hastings area and closely monitors its progress.

Tuesday, 10th June, 2008