Power-driven project lights up London

This week, it is Battersea Power Station that takes a starring role in the property column.

Of course, you can't actually buy the 1930s-built cultural landmark because a consortium of Malaysian investors snapped it up for £400 million (Dh2.36 billion) in July. But investors will be able to buy up new properties adjacent to the power station and along the South Bank that are part of the Nine Elms regeneration project.

The plan for the power station itself includes offices, homes, shops, restaurants and leisure facilities. The master plan has been approved and work is expected to start next year.

The larger plan for the vast Nine Elms area - spanning 195 hectares between Battersea Park and Lambeth Bridge - envisages the creation of 16,000 new homes and more than 400,000 square metres of commercial property in the next few years, according to the property consultancy Knight Frank.

The multibillion-pound project will transform the former industrial area and as well as homes, will include commercial high-rises, arts and culture venues, and open spaces. Two new Tube stations will link the district to the London Underground network.

Another neighbourhood landmark, the New Covent Garden Market, will also get a £1bn makeover. This will centre on the creation of a modern new wholesale market that will be a new food centre for London.

As well as training and business support facilities, there will be restaurants, cafes, start-up units and commercial space for food businesses. The two existing landmarks with be joined by a third in 2017: a new US embassy.

Knight Frank predicts that property values in the area will balloon 140 per cent by 2016.

It also reckons that buyers from the UAE will be the seventh-largest investors in the prime property market in London.

lgutcher@thenational.ae