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Location Leeds: a better environment for business

Essential guide to the Leeds commercial property market, showcasing the city's premier business locations. Features out of town and city centre offices, retail and industrial premises. Published in association with Yorkshire Business Insider.

Leeds:The Facts
the key facts

Statistical overview of the economy of Leeds and the city region including information on key sectors, workforce, population and output.

Business in Leeds:
the key facts

Detailed information on the Leeds economy covering everything from financial services to the media, workforce and skills also providing an overview of the Leeds lifestyle including education, leisure and healthcare.

Holbeck Urban Village: a creative location for business

A fast developing location for creative and digital media businesses close to the centre of Leeds. Includes case studies of companies based in the area.

Government departments and agencies

Detailed report is available setting out the advantages of Leeds as a location for government departments and agencies. Includes case studies.

Shared Service Centres

Detailed report on advantages of Leeds as a location for shared services centres. Includes studies of shared services operations based in Leeds.

Making it in Leeds

Detailed report on the manufacturing sector in Leeds, including case studies on some of the city's leading manufacturers.

Conference Leeds

Guide to 290 venues for conferences, seminars and training events in Leeds, Bradford, Huddersfield, Wakefield and Pennine Yorkshire.

Communications

Leeds has a compact city centre and combines ease of commuting with a well connected railway station and international airport. The city is just over two hours by train from London Kings Cross, with rail services to the capital every half hour during the daytime.

BMI, KLM, Jet2.com and Ryanair fly from Leeds Bradford International Airport to leading European business and holiday destinations.

Intercontinental travellers can reach the city via short connecting flights from Amsterdam and Brussels. Manchester International Airport is only an hour away by road or rail.

The M1/A1(M) provides direct motorway access to London and Edinburgh.

The M62 connects the city to Manchester and Liverpool to the west, while Hull and the Humber ports are only an hour’s drive away to the east. These serve more than 50 countries and 70 ports worldwide.

Leeds City Station is one of the busiest in the country outside central London, with over 900 trains and 90,000 passengers passing through the station every day. Major refurbishment has seen £245 million invested in station remodelling.

The city is served by three major freight terminals at Stourton in south Leeds, Wakefield Europort and Doncaster. Bonded warehousing facilities at Stourton allow goods to be stored free of customs duty and VAT.

Public transport services include a pioneering guided bus system. The average distance from house to bus route is under 200 metres.

Average travel to work time in the morning peak period in West Yorkshire is 26 minutes compared with 44 minutes in London. Traffic speed averages 25mph in West Yorkshire and 14mph in London.

The Leeds City Bus runs every few minutes and connects Leeds City Station to the university precinct, hospital, main shopping area, coach and bus station.

The £50 million final stage of the Leeds inner ring road opened in 2008 and linked the city centre to the M621 and the wider motorway network.

The £32 million East Leeds Link Road, joining junction 45 of the M1 to the Leeds inner ring road, opened in 2009.

The city offers a diverse range of connectivity options, with 100 per cent of exchanges broadband enabled. BT, Cable & Wireless Communications and Kingston Communications all provide a full range of applications to businesses.

Businesses also benefit from a range of specialist providers, such as aql, offering from 100 Megabit up to a Gigabit broadband services to businesses, some of the fastest access in the country, and wireless coverage from Metronet UK at Gigabit speeds, allowing rapid installation and low monthly costs.