The British Land Company PLC and the Blackstone Group have submitted a detailed planning application for a new world class office building for financial services firm UBS, called 5 Broadgate. 5 Broadgate will provide a total net office floorspace of approximately 700,000 sq ft, and will include four trading floors capable of accommodating approximately 750 traders per floor. 5 Broadgate will allow UBS to bring together its trading operation into one building in the City.
5 Broadgate will be designed by Ken Shuttleworth at Make, replacing 3, 4 and 6 Broadgate. The building responds to the scale of the Broadgate buildings with the lower trading floors at the height of the Arena and the upper office floors at the height of the adjacent Exchange House and Bishopsgate buildings. It will sit within the swathe of groundscrapers in the City, with the cluster of towers dominating the skyline to the south.
A new public route will be opened up east-west connecting Broadgate Circle with Sun Street Passage to provide a direct route to Liverpool Street Station and to Exchange Square to the north.
A new ‘gateway space’, known as Sun Street Square, with a café at the base of 3 Finsbury will be created to provide a new pedestrian crossing to Crown Place and the northern approach to Finsbury Avenue Square will be redefined with new landscaping. Sun Street Square and Sun Street Passage both present an opportunity for the incorporation of public art, including an ‘art wall’.
Innovative environmental measures will be incorporated into the building design including generating low carbon energy with photovoltaics and solar thermal panels, reducing water consumption by rainwater harvesting and increasing biodiversity through the incorporation of green roofs and terraces.
Chris Grigg, Chief Executive of The British Land Company PLC, said: “It is vital that the City is able to meet the current and future needs of key occupiers for attractive, flexible and sustainable floorspace as financial services will be a major driver in the recovery of the UK economy from recession.