Weymouth: Mixing business with pleasure

Two hundred years ago “the grateful Inhabitants” of Weymouth erected a statue in honour of George the Third. Weymouth used to be just a small port, best known as the place where the Black Death entered Britain and killed millions of people.

Then came the King; doctors thought seawater might salve his incipient madness and so he spent 14 summers gadding about South Dorset. Drinking seawater and bathing failed to cure him, but his patronage transformed Weymouth. Take the seafront, which had pretty much been neglected. It had a knot of fishermen’s huts and was a dumping ground for rubbish. Developed as an esplanade, it became the place to see and be seen.

Weymouth was Britain’s most fashionable resort. Money poured in, and a mass of commercial property sprang up – hotels and lodging houses, elegant terraces, theatres, coffee houses, taverns, assembly rooms, circulating libraries, spas, and ranks of curious bathing machines. For this royally-inspired regeneration, the people of South Dorset gave thanks.

Jump forward to the earliest years of the twenty-first century and the inhabitants of Weymouth would like nothing more than to celebrate another commercial resurgence. Defence cutbacks – chiefly the closure of the Portland Naval Base and Royal Naval Air Station – have hit the area hard. Weymouth is still popular with holidaymakers, but cheap flights abroad have increased competition. The once-grand Coade stone statue of King George III has deteriorated; gulls and pigeons befoul his person; a wag has given him a squint.

Look at him now in 2010, after an expensive and award-winning restoration. All that gold leaf glows with intent; there is now clear and straightforward vision. The fresh look is a powerful symbol of South Dorset’s desire to cover itself again in glory.

The transformation of the area has occurred with the converged of several factors over the last few years. UNESCO decided that most of Dorset’s coastline was of universal value for its geological interest and its beauty. As such, 95 miles of coastline from Swanage in Dorset down to Exmouth in Devon became Britain’s first natural World Heritage Site, known popularly as the Jurassic Coast for its wealth of fossils.

In 2005, London won the right to host the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games. In accordance, the sailing and windsurfing events will be held in Portland harbour and in Weymouth Bay, against the spectacular backdrop of the Jurassic Coast.

The prospect of the world’s eyes being upon South Dorset prompted the Government – after decades of wrangling – to fund a new £87.4m relief road between Weymouth and the county town of Dorchester, which is due to open in October of this year.

Earlier this summer, Dorset County Council began spending £16m on traffic improvement schemes around Weymouth and along the route to the Isle of Portland. Also this summer, the fashion chain New Look began consulting with the public over plans to rebuild its Weymouth HQ on a site close to the new relief road. If New Look gets permission the retail brand will create a 30-acre mixed commercial development adding a major supermarket, a 1,500 park and ride scheme and an 88-bed hotel.

The local Olympic base will be the Weymouth and Portland National Sailing Academy, which is on the site of the old Royal Naval Air Station, now owned by the South West RDA and known as Osprey Quay. It’s the first Olympic facility to be completed at a total cost of £16m. Nearby is a new £20m Dean & Reddyhoff 650-berth marina. Also being developed at Osprey Quay is a centre for marine excellence, supported by Weymouth and Portland Borough Council and anchored by the luxury yachtmakers Sunseeker.

Next door is Portland Harbour Authority, a thriving and successful commercial facility that maintains a close relationship with its Royal Navy past through an ongoing contract to support the RFA. It’s also home to Global Marine and Portland Bunkers International. Also on the island is Portland Gas – a £500m underground gas storage development granted planning permission by Dorset County Council.  Down the road, £1m may be spent on revamping the Chesil Beach Visitor Centre.

“South Dorset, and Weymouth in particular, appears not to be representative of the rest of the country. There’s been so much investment in recent years that Weymouth is out-performing, and almost becoming slightly recession proof,” says Mickey Jones, chief executive of DJ Property.

Over the last 40 years, it’s grown to be one of the area’s market leader in commercial lettings and development. Mr Jones has currently got Dorset-based Mildren Construction building an extension to Oxford Court, a modern courtyard-style development on the western edge of Weymouth, near another new investment, the £2.5m Chickerell relief road. Three buildings are split into 20 flexible units, for B1, B2 and B8 uses like storage, trade counters, distribution, training, and office work. Three more units will be ready this autumn, making the total spend on Oxford Court about £3.5m.

Mr Jones said: “I had the unlucky circumstance that I had Oxford Court ready just in time for the recession, but it proves that if you build the right quality in the right place, the location and the quality of the building will let itself.”
Indeed, Oxford Court has remained almost fully let since its inception. It sits on the edge of the rock-steady powerhouse of South Dorset trade, the Granby industrial estate, whose first buildings went up in the early 1960s and is now the largest trading estate in South and West Dorset. It boasts a non-compete blend of local, national and international businesses, ranging from Aquarium Technology – the makers of perspex tanks used to house Damien Hirst’s formaldehyde artworks to established trade operators such as City Plumbing and Europcar.

The land now occupied by Oxford Court was for nearly 80 years a scrapyard.

Developers in Dorset need to adapt what’s available, more so than almost anywhere else. Why? Because more than two-fifths of the county is classified as an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, which puts it, in planning terms, on a par with national parks. It’s extremely difficult to stud AONBs and World Heritage Sites with new commercial developments. But planning restrictions are meant to preserve Dorset’s quality of life, and that intangible but unmistakeable sensation of quality has a value all of its own. It’s what kept King George III coming back for years and years; it’s the golden glow that Dorset hopes will shine through from the Olympics for years to come.

Mr Jones said: “I don’t think we’ll be inundated with millions of people watching sailing events. The real value to Dorset is that it’s a Games venue that everybody throughout the world will hear about. Weymouth and Portland will stand in the spotlight of the biggest show on earth. This global familiarisation will encourage people to visit over the years to come, and the attractiveness of the area and the quality of life will keep them coming back.”

Leading-edge connectivity is another key part of the area’s long-term strategy. Mr Jones commented: “More and more businesses are not reliant on a particular location, what they are depending on is IT and communications. Because of the Olympics, Weymouth and Portland are getting fibre optic links to Stratford in East London – here…we’ll have broadband speeds in the region of 100 megabits per second. Combine this with the benefits of other converging factors – transport infrastructure, the Olympic spotlight and a fast growing tourist and industrial sector – and you have a heady mix that will encourage even more businesses to relocate here.”

The grateful inhabitants of modern Dorset have not yet begun erecting statues to such entities as the Olympics and UNESCO. But other monuments to their impact, such as the great improvements to the area, abound.