NOTTINGHAM | Bio City Expansion | 80,000 Sqft | 33m | 108FT | 6 floors

Height - 33m / 108ft

Space - 80,000 Sqft / 7432 Sqm

Use - Commercial (Bio Science)

Developer - Nottingham City Council partnered with Bio City

Architects - CPMG

Website - https://www.biocity.co.uk/biocity/nottingham

Expected Completion - 2017

Nottinghams Bio City is expanding, by an extra 80,000Sqft. The interest in such a development peaked when Walgreen bought out Boots, a Nottingham founded and based company, for £9Billion.

Bio City has been in Nottingham for many years. With the peak in interest, Nottingham City Council and Bio City formed a joint venture to expand the science industry in the city back in 2014. The idea behind the proposal is for ‘smaller’ and ‘start-up’ Bio Science companies to have space in the city. The overall plan is for these to grow, and hopefully stay within the city; meaning a stronger economy in a future proof sector, further developments on the neighbouring ‘East Side’ site, along with strengthening the bonds between Nottinghams Chemist Giants and the universities.

The reason for the joint venture is due to Nottingham City Council supposedly having ‘deep pockets’ compared with other councils across the country, of which they buy up sites and co develop with other developers. This has happened previously for Eons 105,000Sqft Head Quarters in the city back in 2011/2012, after realising this was a success, they are now using this strategy going forward to boost the city ahead of the competition.

The lighting scheme on the west facing side is said to be ‘embedded with fibre-optic lights which respond to solar-flare signals from NASA satellites.’

The development, as mentioned is said to kick start the further ‘East Side’ development, as well as the Former NCT Bus Depot proposal, hoping to create this area as a very strong business destination:

View from the castle (they’re are some significant plans in the pipeline for the concrete buildings towards the foreground of which I will share at a later date)

Rendered video of the build:

Massing diagrams:

The photos below were taken by me. This building really does add a great deal to the street-scape, it helps to make this area feel much more built up, especially as it lines the inner ring road.

The window frames starting to be being installed:

I can’t wait until the plans are revealed for the barren land, known as Eastside, to be revealed:

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A bit of history for you guys of this site.

Back in 2007, Nottinghams Real Estate Tycoon, Chek Whyte put forward proposals for this site, consisting of a 51 storey residential tower, with a roof garden, accompanied by a 22 storey commercial tower, rising to 149m and 80m tall respectively. The tallest of which would’ve been double the height of Nottinghams current tallest build, Victoria Centre, at 26 storeys.

The Chek Whyte Towers were designed by Ian Simpson, the same architect who designed the Beetham Tower and Owen Street Towers in Manchester, along with a number of other proposals.

From being put forward to the council later that year, the proposal was recommended for approval. Giving the green light for what would have been the second tallest tower in the UKoutside of London, and the 8th tallest in the country at the time.

A year later, in 2008, once the recession had fully kicked in, Chek Whyte went into administration and along came crashing the Chek Whyte Towers.

This project was the reason as to why I became so involved with developments on the internet, it’s a shame that such a development never came to fruition.

Below are renders of the cancelled Chek Whyte project:

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That would have been fantastic, although something > nothing I guess.

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That’s a shame, Stig.

That design would have gotten me amped up as well.

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