Last year was a record year for development growth with the focus on medium-sized schemes in secondary towns and cities, according to Jones Lang LaSalle’s new report ‘Shopping Centre Development - Boom or Bust?’.

Over 300 shopping centres were completed, accounting for 7.9m sqm of space, with Russia once again being the most active market, accounting for 13% of new space delivered. Turkey also experienced another strong year with nearly 1m sqm completed. As in 2007, Central & Eastern Europe (CEE) dominated with 55% of completions, and there are still several large schemes under construction.

Neville Moss, head of EMEA Retail Research, said: “Last year (2008) was a record year for new space delivered, but given the current financial climate it is inevitable that the pace of development will slow over the next two years and a substantial amount of planned space is expected to be delayed.”

However, Moss pointed out that in 2008 the actual amount of space that opened was 5.5m sqm lower than the 2007 prediction of 13.7m sqm. Most new developments are currently taking place in Turkey, Italy and Russia and much of the proposed space for 2009 is already under construction, and it is doubtful that it will be stalled.

Moss believes 2010 will be less active and it is anticipated that a significant proportion of the proposed 11.3m sqm pipeline will be put on hold if economic prospects continue to deteriorate. Corrections to the development pipeline will be absorbed mostly by those markets that have grown considerably over the past three years, notably Russia and Turkey.