Member Article

Region leads way for UK hotel construction in February

The North West accounted for more than a third of the total value of hotel, leisure and sport construction contracts in the UK in February, according to a recent report.

The value of hotel, leisure and sport construction contracts in the region totalled more than £113.399 million in February, accounting for 35.6 per cent of the overall contracts awarded for the sector UK-wide - an increase of 28.8 per cent from the same month last year.

This is largely attributable to key projects such as the £45 million mixed use hotel and office scheme at City Wharf, Salford and a £42.5 million hotel development at Albert Dock in Liverpool.

These latest figures, taken from Barbour ABI’s Economic & Construction Market Review, highlight encouraging growth in the hotel, leisure and sport construction sector across the UK. It confirms that the value of projects totalled £512 million in February based on a three-month rolling average – a 1.8 per cent increase on January and 25.3 per cent rise compared to the same month last year.

Michael Dall, lead economist at Barbour ABI, commented: “The hotel, leisure and sport construction sector put in a strong performance last month, and it was encouraging to see cities outside of London, like Manchester and Liverpool, leading this growth.

“These large hotel contracts resulted in hotels representing the highest proportion of contracts awarded in the sector this month, at 55 per cent of total value, which is 32% higher than February 2013. The other major type of project awarded this month was leisure centres, which equated to 14 per cent of the total value.”

The Economic & Construction Market Review is a monthly report designed to give valuable, current insight into UK construction industry performance.

It is compiled from Barbour ABI’s records of construction data for every UK planning application, and key indicators, such as the Office for National Statistics’ Construction New Orders data.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Simon Malia .