Top 50 Indie EG On The Move’s growth continues apace, with the firm hoping to build a new-to-sector filling station on land previously occupied by a Jaguar Land Rover showroom in Stockton-on-Tees, County Durham, and this being the latest in at least a dozen forecourts the firm currently has in planning or construction.
In the last couple of months alone the company has applied for permission to demolish three former pubs – in Worcestershire, Cheshire, and Greater Manchester – and turn them into forecourts, while Torbay Council is currently considering whether the company can knock down a motorhome dealer on a major tourist route in Devon and build a new filling station in its place.
While local authorities often put up resistance to EGOTM’s projects (one councillor described the Greater Manchester forecourt as a ”drag-and-drop development”) the company has a determined approach to planning difficulties.
In July the Scottish government granted the firm permission to build a new forecourt a stone’s throw from Glasgow Airport, overruling Renfrewshire Council, whose rejection of the project EGOTM had appealed. Last month the company was told it could go ahead and rebuild a forecourt in Ipswich, Suffolk, following a lengthy planning battle, while Zuber Issa’s firm had a similarly successful appeal for a project in Merseyside after initial council refusal and a two-year planning process.
Other sites in the pipeline include a new-to-sector PFS on a business park in Grimsby; a new-build forecourt on an “eyesore” patch of wasteland in Middlesbrough; a fresh filling station and drive-thru Starbucks near Hartlepool; and a Bradford project that is set to see a former Mercedes dealership added to EG On The Move’s portfolio.
These projects have all been reported in the past six months, and come in addition to the 85 former Prax forecourts EGOTM acquired in July.
The firm’s latest Stockton project concerns a plot of land that used to be a JLR dealership but has lain vacant for “and extended period” according to planning documents. The company is looking to rejuvenate the site by erecting a three-pump-island filling station served by two 75,000-litre tanks.
Around 20 new jobs will be created if Stockton-on-Tees Borough council gives EG On The move the green light, while facing the pumps will be one of the firm’s standard-format glass-fronted mono-pitch-roofed shops, in this instance spanning 3,370sq ft.
Customer parking will be to the front of the shop, with a pair of additional bays on the opposite end of the forecourt together with four EV charging spots.
