Page 20 - MJC submissions

STEPS TOWARDS AN AGREED STATEMENT OF FACTS
And stipulations

3 Important Background (Continued)
3.3 The EDF Building
The now deserted EDF office block was built in 1952 as a contingency centre - in response to
the Cold War - by the central electricity authorities;
 It has a total footprint of 32,905 sq.ft (3,057 sq.m), spread over two floors; Page | 10

 It supposedly has a bomb proof bunker;

 It was purchased on a date unknown - by the current owner GCP Developments Ltd - and
leased to EDF as a call centre (The lease expired in September 2017 and the building is
currently unoccupied);
 The site contains a 35m high mobile telephone tower shared by at least three operators
under what is believed to be a lease agreement. The terms of the agreement are not
known, but it is unlikely that the operators would be keen to remove the tower. It is, in
fact, a poison pill against future development and seriously devalues the site;

 It has 64 car parking spaces;

 The total site area of 1.437ha includes 0.597ha of ancient woodland;
 The building has been modified as a call centre with around 250 terminals. Operations
were curtailed following a complaint by neighbours of unbearable noise from its air
conditioning (computer cooling) system;

 For the last few years less than 200 employees were based in the building: many working
on a shift system;
The traffic flows to and from the defunct EDF building are not a meaningful baseline
for the proposed development. The “existing” traffic flow is zero.

3.4 Ashgrove Homes Limited (AHL)
AHL is the main applicant in both the proposed and anticipated development.

 It is a UK based company incorporated on 20 March 2013 and operates as a high-quality
th
builder (No 08453216);

 It is managed by a highly professional and experienced UK team, led by Peter Owen.
Managing Director;
 It has issued 100,000 of £1 shares. These are owned 50:50 by the Keynejad Family Trust
and Jamshid Mark Kenyejad: both are based in the USA;

 The proposed developments - which have a Gross Development Value (GDV) of an
estimated £34,000,000 – appear to represent the largest project that AHL has managed.
However, its UK directors have qualifying experience of large projects and should be
capable of delivery;

 The last accounts filed in September 2019 show negative shareholders’ funds of £53,378

It is possible that the proposed developments will be highly leveraged and exposed
to even small market fluctuations. These could affect deliverability.