Boom time for boom town - Reading 2024

6th December 2023

While 2023 was definitely a busy and positive year for the Reading economy, next year promises even more. Coming to Reading will be the completion of a slice of Hollywood, the opening of 275,000 sq ft of new office space at One Station Hill and the delivery of major town centre housing developments as we continue to realise Reading’s 2050 City Vision, which together with the Reading Net Zero carbon deadline of 2030, is getting ever closer.

Hollywood on Thames

By spring next year when the final five film stages are completed at Shinfield Studios, Reading will be a major player in the international film, TV and production business with the most modern, production-friendly film and HETV studio facilities available in the UK.

Shinfield Studios has already opened 13 fully soundproofed and air-conditioned stages which are being used by the likes of Sony who partly filmed Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire in Reading (release date 2024). By spring, it will offer film and television producers nearly 1 million sq ft of studio space comprising 18 soundstages, 38 workshops, substantial office space, and a 9-acre filming backlot. Great news for the hospitality sector in Reading and many other businesses as REDA facilitates access into the film production supply chain. In tandem, Screen Berkshire has been launched to focus on providing opportunities for Berkshire people of all backgrounds to train or update their skills and help match the continued high demand for skilled film production crew.

Housing for a skilled workforce

A massive injection of town centre housing is coming on stream to attract skilled workers to the town and offer a wider range of accommodation for workers already based here. Identified by The Times as a top residential location and “hard to fault” for first time buyers, Reading is developing a housing stock to attract high-calibre professionals to relocate to work for the knowledge-based companies located here. The Times report assessed locations based on vitality and value for money,  combining good-value properties with exciting lifestyle options. A Savills report this year concurred, identifying Reading as attractive to graduates and millennials.

On the north side of Friar Street, the first apartments of the Ebb & Flow development have residents already installed with more to come. Over 1000 new apartments are being proposed by S2 and Abrdn at their respective sites on the Thames Valley Police HQ in Castle Street and Forbury Retail Park. Berkeley Homes’ Huntley Wharf development of 715 flats is very close to completion alongside the Kennet and boasts a new plaza alongside the canal, complete with dancing fountains. While The Oracle have plans to build a 19-storey residential block at the former Debenhams end of the mall, creating 202 build-to-rent flats and Broad Street Mall have proposals for the redevelopment of the shopping centre with 604 homes in three towers. The new owners of the Thames fronting former Covea insurance building, Packaged Living and Bridges Fund Management, are looking to create 234 new build-to-rent homes opposite the station.

An ever-growing business location

While the pandemic has undoubtedly altered working habits, forward-looking companies recognise the positive benefits that face-to-face collaboration, networking and social interaction brings to business outputs and staff recruitment and retention. In Reading, there are promising indicators that the office market is alive and well. However, the demand for offices in the post-COVID era comes linked to increasingly high-quality environmental standards and a requirement for spaces to be flexible and promote staff interaction. Reading currently has 1.13m sqft of BREAMM rated office space available (the highest environmental standard) of over 2.5 million sq ft available office space within a five-mile radius of the town centre and more stock of the highest quality under development at Station Hill. One Station Hill is due to deliver 15 floors of BREEAM Excellent-rated space in 2024 with more phases to follow.

In the 12 months up to September 2023, 61 lease deals had been completed in Reading, totalling 270.000 sq ft so the office market certainly has life in it yet. And it is not just offices that are investing here. Biopharmaceuticals group Lonza have made a massive investment to purchase three buildings with a footprint of 400,000 sq ft at Thames Valley Park in Reading, with plans to develop the 12-acre site to create a new lab, manufacturing as well as office development, one of the largest developments in the region for some time. This decision demonstrates Reading’s potential for growing the laboratory sector here and the critical place we play in the UK pharma economy which stretches beyond the Oxford/Cambridge axis. Lonza will be joining other major pharma businesses in Reading like Bayer and Sanofi.

And look out for the British Museum, Natural History Museum and Kew Gardens having a presence in Reading in the coming years as they open research and archive facilities here.

A new look town centre

With the vast 2.5 million sq ft Station Hill residential, office and retail development re-imagining the gateway into the town centre from the station with two acres of new public realm, 1,300 new homes, 95,000 sq ft of activated lifestyle-led retail, leisure, and amenity space and 625,000 sq ft of office space, Reading is changing fast. On the opposite side of Friar Street, Thackery Estates’ redevelopment plans include a hotel, an aparthotel, new shopfronts and a courtyard at ground level.

Key to the continued success of the town centre are Reading’s two Business Improvement Districts (BID). Over a hundred businesses in the town centre Reading Business Improvement District (BID) and Abbey Quarter BID areas came together recently to learn more about plans for two new BIDs in Reading for 2024-29. The current BIDs reach the end of their current terms in March 2024 and a vote for continuity in the New Year will be vital to support a vibrant Reading town centre.

Transport

While the fast 23-minute GWR mainline service from Reading to London has long underpinned Reading’s success as a business and living location, the recent arrival of the Elizabeth Line now provides direct connectivity with the West End, The City and Canary Wharf, putting Reading on the London transport map.  Locally, more major investment has seen Green Park Station open this year unlocking connectivity to Green Park Business Park, the Select Car Leasing Stadium and the new residential quarter at Green Park Village while Reading West Station is being transformed to improve access to rail services west of the town centre.

Transport of a different sort – this time in the sky, Reading’s Altitude Angel will be launching the UK’s first super drone highway in Reading next summer linking us with the Midlands via a 10km wide route for pilotless drones.

What do others say about Reading

• The Daily Mail says the ‘Reading revival is on a roll’ highlighting Reading's great connectivity, lifestyle and new residential developments as providing a great opportunity for relocating.
• The ‘Innovation hotspots, Clustering the New Economy’ report by thinktank Centre for Cities identifies Reading as the UK's 2nd most favourable location for ‘hotspots’ of innovation-based companies outperforming London and all the UK’s major cities bar Cambridge.
• The annual health of the UK economy report by PWC/Demos places Reading 10th among the UK’s 51 top cities for 'good growth' with particular strengths in low unemployment, high average incomes, highly skilled workforce and new businesses setting up and jobs created.
• The 2023 FDI Small European Cities ranks Reading third overall in Europe and first for Business Friendliness.   “For foreign firms, it is an investment destination in its own right. The city has become a magnet for software and IT firms, with the sector amassing 26 project announcements in the five years to November 2022.”
• All this makes Reading an attractive location for business and shows why Reading continues to compete as a business location. Early next year, REDA will be investing in a targeted marketing plan to attract new companies in the key growth sectors of film production, life sciences, digital tech and energy.  Attracting energy businesses builds on the University’s investment in the climate sciences and attraction of the global climate research and monitoring HQ, the ECMRWF, which will form the largest concentration of life scientists in the world.

This year may have seen a raft of investments head to Reading but 2024 promises to top that. The future looks bright for boom town Reading!