UPDATE: |Can Trafford City be ‘the best retail and leisure destination in the world’? News

Peel Waters boss James Whittaker tells us about his ambitions for district that includes a £400m spa complex, ice arena and surf centre

James Whittaker is one of the most enthusiastic people you could hope to meet, which is helpful because he’s got a massive ambition – to make Trafford City “the best retail and leisure destination in the world”.

Developer Peel Waters is leading the redevelopment of the area, which is set to include a £400m water park to attract millions of visitors, an ice arena, a surf park and a luxury hotel.

The Peel group, founded by billionaire John Whittaker, developed the massive Trafford Centre in the 1990s – and while it long ago sold that retail and leisure centre, Peel has continued with its plans to develop the area around it. The wider Peel group has become a business behemoth whose interests stretch from MediaCity to the Port of Liverpool and the Manchester Ship Canal.

Now the next generation of the family is leading the way, with John Whittaker’s son James now leading the group’s regeneration arm Peel Waters.

Some big business leaders can be dry and cautious. That’s not James’s way – his passion for his job and for the family business is infectious. Over coffee in Manchester he had an excited enthusiasm for his work and for the many projects that are under way or in the pipeline in Trafford and beyond.

That enthusiasm was on show when he took to the stage at the launch of Greater Manchester’s new visitor economy strategy in January. He bombarded the audience with facts about the sheer scale and ambitions of Peel’s Trafford projects – which encompass everything from the gigantic £400m Therme waterpark to a new ice arena, a growing heliport, and even the industrial complex at Port Salford that will indirectly help Manchester United’s plans for a new stadium at Old Trafford.

That means he has to meet his father’s ambitious goals for developments like TraffordCity. It’s a big ask, but one James approaches with clear enthusiasm.

“My father said to me 10 or 15 years ago that he wanted Trafford City to be the best retail and leisure destination in the world,” he smiled. “Like that’s not a hard challenge, dad!

“But that’s the objective. He’s always said – if you’re going to aim for the mountain, aim for the top.”

Giant water park ‘could bring 650k visitors to Manchester’

One example of Peel Waters’ ambition is the massive £400m Therme water resort that’s being built at the former EventCity site, next to Trafford Palazzo. The 28-acre site is set to feature 25 swimming pools and 30 water slides as well as swim-up bars, saunas and wellness suites.

James is passionate about what the venue will mean for Manchester, though agreed it was hard to envisage the scale of it. There is already a giant Therme in Bucharest, but the Manchester one will be even bigger.

Dianne Bourne from the MEN visited Therme Bucharest to get an idea of what the Trafford venue might be like – James even directed me to that piece to demonstrate Therme’s scale.

James says the 700,000 sqft Therme Trafford will be a major tourism destination for the North West. Preparatory works have started at the Therme site, and the “first major construction phase” is set to begin “later this year”

“Bucharest is the best comparison and that’s 400,000 sq ft,” he said. “That gets 1.6m visitors a year. We should get 2m visitors a year.

““A third of customers that go to Bucharest are tourists – 500k or so. If we get 2m at Trafford , we could get 650,000 tourists just coming to Therme.”

To illustrate his point about Therme visitors sticking around in Greater Manchester, James points to the way the nearby indoor ski slope Chill Factore brings in visitors from far afield, who stay in and explore the city region.

“A huge amount of customers come from London, especially at the weekend,” he said.

“We want those visitors to explore what the city has to offer. We’re big Northerners. We’re proud we’re in the North.”

Surf park, ice arena and hotel all on the cards

Peel is also still pursuing plans for an indoor surf park at Trafford City, and is talking to operators to get plans confirmed.

James said: “We are talking to two operators. The development that came forward got [planning permission but couldn’t land the funding.

“We’ve got two operators, one in Bristol, one in Edinburgh. They’re out trying to secure funding for it. It’s first past the post.”

Plans for an ice arena on the former Soccer Dome site are also moving ahead, with James hoping the venue could open in 2027 subject to planning. The planned 3,000-seat venue would be one of the biggest of its kind in the country, and will also serve as a multi-use events space.

And Peel also wants to create a high-end lifestyle hotel at the site “to encourage people to stay longer and explore the area”.

James said: “We’re talking to some high-end lifestyle brands – global brands. We’re looking to have a 200-bed hotel.”

Housing developments at Trafford Waters are also moving ahead, with the area set to welcome 3,000 new homes as well as more than 700,000 sq ft of commercial space.

Peel has a long partnership with Liverpool’s X1 Developments. X1 has built homes at other Peel sites including Pomona Island and MediaCity – and X1’s first ever development in the south is at Peel’s Chatham Waters site.

Just last month, X1 announced it was ready to build its latest “stylish” apartments at Trafford Waters. Its chief executive Nick Sweeney said: “X1 Trafford Waters will be instrumental in delivering a bright and promising future for TraffordCity, marking a significant step forward in creating a vibrant and dynamic community. We are proud to play a central role in shaping the next chapter of this thriving area.”

Elsewhere at Trafford Waters, Montpelier Estates’ 85-bed care home at the site will soon be completed. Meanwhile L&Q’s 350-home affordable housing development was approved in 2023, and work on that scheme is ongoing.

Why Port Salford is vital to Manchester United’s Old Trafford plans

James’ job is to lead Peel Waters, which encompasses six waterfront mixed use regeneration sites across the UK from Glasgow to Kent via Greater Manchester, as well as the industrial and logistics hub at Port Salford.

There, Peel is working on plans to develop Port Salford as a business and logistics hub, making use of its great rail, road and water connections.

Containers can be shipped up the Manchester Ship Canal from Peel’s Port of Liverpool and unloaded at Port Salford, from where they can be sent across the country by train.

The site is already busy but it could get busier still as proposals to turn Old Trafford into a “national stadium for the north”.

At the moment the area around Manchester United’s stadium is what Mr Whitaker calls “no man’s land” thanks largely to its neighbouring rail freight terminals. If the stadium and surroundings are to be rebuilt, those freight services would need to be moved to two other North West locations – Parkside, in St Helens, and Peel’s Port Salford.

That also removes freight from the congested Castlefield corridors, which will also help passenger transit through the city and the wider North West

Using the Port Salford trans-shipment route could also help reduce the number of lorries on the roads, which would help cut CO2 emissions locally as well as reducing congestion on roads.

And growing Port Salford will also be a spur for more industrial regeneration and redevelopment along the ship canal.

James says that the investment in Port Salford is also good news for the Port of Liverpool, where Peel Ports invested £350m into the massive Liverpool2 container terminal to allow it to welcome some of the world’s largest container ships.

James says the Whittaker family is proud to see giant ships docking below the port’s now-landmark giant red cranes, and added: “That investment has really paid off.”

Reach for the skies: Peel’s helicopter ambitions

Peel’s ambitions even stretch to the skies, as the company is looking to welcome more fliers to Barton Aerodrome, previously known as City Airport.

The CGI for Trafford City shown at the Manchester visitor economy event showed the airport with a hard runway for “mini jets”, rather than its current grass runway. While Peel is considering that option as a potential long-term development, James says the aerodrome’s immediate growth potential lies in its adjacent Manchester Heliport. It offers a complementary service to Manchester Airport, which has few helicopter movements, and as a result James says it has become busier in recent years.

“When there’s a big sporting event or a public event, the heliport is really busy,” he said, adding that it was particularly busy during the British Grand Prix last year.

“People use it to fly into Manchester. Even the King has landed there – I loved that.”