More than 75 million square feet of planned shopping centre development across Europe is currently on hold or has been cancelled, according to the latest report from Cushman & Wakefield. The real estate firm’s European Shopping Centre Development report indicates that it expects approximately 107 million square feet of new shopping centre space to open in Europe in 2009. That is 40 percent less than forecast last summer, and 2010 will see even less space, with 75 million square feet now projected to open.
The lowered forecast follows a record year for shopping centres in Europe, as more than 96 million square feet of space opened in 310 developments. Russia was the leader with 17 million square feet of new retail space, followed by Turkey, the UK, Spain and Romania.
With the world economic crisis hitting many sectors hard, the outlook for new shopping space has fallen considerably. Cushman noted that emerging markets will be impacted significantly, but this is not necessarily a bad thing for the long term in these markets.
Alexander Colpaert, a consultant for Cushman & Wakefield’s European research group, noted that “This environment therefore gives developers, retailers and local governments the time to assess the current situation and, for example, to examine how well-provided certain cities now are and what the impact would be of further large scale schemes onthe current retail landscape. Moreover, the pause will give existing schemes a chance to bed down and establish themselves in the local retail hierarchy.”
