Amazon invest in Liverpool City Region

Online retail giant Amazon is investing in Liverpool City Region’s Knowsley district. The company is understood to have exchanged contracts for Peel Logistics Property’s site, which can accommodate a warehouse of up to 835,000 sq ft.

Aerial of Amazon’s Knowsley site in Liverpool City Region

PLP was set up in 2015 as a joint venture between Macquarie and Peel Group, with Canadian property group Ivanhoé Cambridge buying into the partnership in 2018.

PLP previously had a flexible outline consent in place for the 37-3-acre K800 site in Knowsley, allowing it to either advance one shed of around 800,000 sq ft or two smaller sheds, in a regional market that is increasingly short of both completed space and oven-ready sites.

In March 2020, PLP’s planning advisor WSP submitted a full application for a sole, larger warehouse, informing Knowsley Council that “an end-user has been secured who requires an uplift,” both requiring a small increase in floorspace and an additional access point.

That request was granted, along with minor amendments requested in October. AEW is the scheme’s architect.

The site, off Moss Lane in Knowsley Business Park, was formerly occupied by Sonae Tafibra, and was acquired for Peel Land & Property by Lambert Smith Hampton in 2015, before being transferred to the PLP business.

Development of the site in the following years was hampered by routing and access issues, resolved in 2019 with a programme of works by Sterling Services.

Other Amazon sites in the North West include space at Warrington’s Omega, Bericote’s M6Major in Haydock and a 654,000 sq ft warehouse at Airport City.

According to agents, Amazon, fuelled yet further by booming online sales during lockdown, is still on the search for sites in the region for both short and long-term occupation.

B8 Real Estate and JLL are joint agents on the PLP Knowsley site, while CBRE is instructed by Amazon.