Bid to attract more national companies

A Timaru man is hoping to attract national retailers to the industrial enclave of Washdyke with his redevelopment plans.

Steve Parker owns eight business premises on Hilton Highway, including the recently closed On Your Behalf Warehouse store and the Wool Store.

Parker said the warehouse shop had closed after its owner of more than a decade, John Dingwall, decided to retire.

Dingwall said people who had furniture they had supplied to be sold at the shop would have been paid the value of the furniture.

However he said anyone who had any queries about their furniture should contact him.

Parker, who had owned the building for the last couple of years, said plans were afoot for the now vacant building.

‘‘I’m going to redevelop it, put a new front up and do it up. I am just doing them up as people move.’’

The Wool Store, which had also been closed by business owner Barry Taylor, was being chopped up into smaller, redeveloped retail units.

‘‘It’s such a big building ... I want to make it more into retail shops, split that into three shops, do it all up and put new frontages on it.

‘‘The interest I have had has been from a lot of national companies who want 300 to 400 square metre sites.’’

His plans for the building were currently before the Timaru District Council.

However, builders were booked in to begin work in five weeks time.

Parker said he was planning to eventually redevelop all eight premises he owned.

A former fibreglass factory at 155 Hilton Highway, which had been redeveloped by Parker with a new roof and office space had already been leased to Blacks Fasteners, who he said were moving in on May 1.

A plot of land Parker had bought behind the BP service station further south towards Timaru was also set for develop- ment as a potential retail complex, Parker said.

Parker said the conversations with retailers he was looking to attract to his premises had not only been centred around the sites being a particular size, but also by the constant flow of thousands of cars a day through Washdyke.

He was also buoyed by continuing expansion in in the area.

‘‘Everything is at the north end of town, that’s where it seems to be happening,’’ he said.

‘‘The council are making more land available, they are definitely proactive.’’

Another redevelopment, being funded by shareholders Hilton Nominees, on the old Seedlands site at the turnoff to Pleasant Point on State Highway One was progressing ‘‘slowly’’, its chairman said.

Ken Buckingham said the consents for the project were still moving through the council process.

The planned retail developments in Washdyke come less than two months after community-owned lines company Alpine Energy installed a series of high voltage, underground cable circuits in the area.

At the time company chief executive Andrew Tombs, said the ongoing $4 million cable project was to guarantee energy for future expansion of the area.

‘‘Over the last few years there have been land-use changes in the wider Washdyke area. More land is being zoned for industrial development and with that comes more demand for electricity.

‘‘Once completed, the new infrastructure will provide consumers in the general Washdyke industrial and outlying areas with a substantial increase in available capacity, improved reliability and security of supply for the next 15-20 years.’’