Businessmen agree to pay over £6.5m for car-park at complex

FOUR Dublin businessmen are to pay in excess of £6.5 million for a two-storey car-park under construction beside the new Bloomfields shopping centre in Dun Laoghaire. All but two of the 25 shops planned for the retail centre have already been let - three months before the £20 million complex opens for business.

Although the businessmen have agreed purchase terms for the 550-space car-park, formal contracts have not yet been exchanged. The businessmen will be able to claim tax relief on 50 per cent of the construction costs, 25 per cent of it in the first year. In addition the car-park operator can avail of double rent allowances for a 10-year period.

The top floor of the car-park is to be closed at 10 pm. daily to comply with the planning regulations but the lower floor will remain open at night to cater mainly for people attending a multiplex cinema, which will open later this year.

Monarch Properties, which is developing the centre, is understood to be selling a site to Ward Anderson, which has sought revised planning permission to build 12 cinemas instead of the seven approved. The site is worth more than £1 million.

The opening of the new shopping centre is expected to provide stiff competition for a rival shopping centre in Dun Laoghaire and more particularly for two others in Blackrock - the Frascatti Centre and Superquinn. Bloomfields will be aimed at the middle to top end of the market, anchored by a new-style food hall to be operated by Power Supermarkets.

The food hall will trade as Bloomfields, the same name as one in Bangor, Co Down, which is run by Powers' sister group in the North, Stewarts. The £10 million food hall will have a floor area of 50,000 square feet and will be even more glitzy than Quinnsworth's outlet in the Merrion Centre. Powers will own its store but the tenants of 25 other shops will be paying a rent of £31 per square foot, according to Ed Douglas of Douglas Newman Good.

The biggest attraction in the centre may still be Boots, which is taking 4,000 square feet in what will be its first outlet in south Dublin. Another major multiple, Argos, is to occupy 6,500 square feet on two levels and it will trade alongside Benetton, Graft on Street fashion retailer Airwave, Peter Mark and Diffney for Men. The complex will also include restaurants and an arts centre.