Elephant regeneration bidders named

The stage one competition closed on Monday. Eight organisations and consortia, including New York billionaire landlord Richard Lefrak and Australian firms Multiplex and Lendlease, have thrown their hat into the ring for consideration.

The Elephant and Castle development team and their professional consultants will now consider whether each of the organisations have the experience, rigour and technical capacity to deliver a programme of the scale required. The scheme spans 170 acres, of which 55 acres form the core developable area, and involves the creation of 75,000 m2 of new retail and leisure space and 5,300 new homes.

Southwark Council created the framework for development, a masterplan for the area's development, and adopted it as supplementary planning guidance in February 2004. A highly regarded professional team, including Foster and Partners, Tibbald's Urban Design, Jan Gehl, Space Syntax, and more recently Make architects and Martha Schwartz have worked on the plans.

Next month a long list will be invited to respond in detail to the development proposals, culminating this autumn in the selection of a shortlist of two or three developers. The shortlisted schemes will then be consulted upon before being put to Southwark Council's executive committee for approval by the start of next year.

"The competition has attracted an immensely strong field for one of the largest development programmes currently available in the UK," commented Elephant and Castle development director Chris Horn. "It gives us great confidence that we can expect a really strong competition through to final selection. The names on the list mean we can expect real variety as we move into short listing stage, which will create distinct choices in the way we take the Elephant and Castle scheme forward.'"

The final list of developers submitting PQQ bids the Elephant and Castle regeneration is:

• Key Property Investments Ltd-joint venture between St Modwen Property and Salhia Real Estate
• Lend Lease Europe Ltd
• Oceancrest – a consortium between Blackfriars Investments, Elliott Bernard, The Lefrak Organisation, Royal London Asset Management, Bank of Scotland
• Canary Wharf Group plc
• Prudential Property Investments Ltd
• Multiplex Developments Ltd
• Taylor Woodrow Development Ltd
• Orion Land and Leisure Ltd