THERE are hopes the first of up to 1,000 people could be working on Eastleigh’s Ford site in the next 18 months.

A deal for a developer to take on the site has now been completed – and they have spoken of their wish to “get on” with their plans.

We reported in November that Mountpark was set to take on the former factory – and the company has now signed a deal to return jobs to the site in Swaythling.

The site’s familiar plant buildings have since been torn down after the controversial end of Transit production which had taken place in the city for more than 40 years.

That now paves the way for a fresh chapter in the site’s history with Ford entrusting the marketing of the site to commercial agents Cushman and Wakefield.

Mountpark emerged as the frontrunner and the firm has now sealed the deal to take over the site.

Plans for what will replace the Transit site are at an early stage, but it would contain a mixture of units that could be occupied by logistics, manufacturing and other types of businesses.

It is Mountpark’s fourth major site in the UK, with the company developing major industrial and logistics complexes across the country including at Manchester Airport City, Wakefield in West Yorkshire and Bardon in Leicestershire.

It has been reported that the firm bid £20million for the site, which it could turn into a 450,000sq ft logistics park featuring industrial elements.

The company, which has offices in Luxembourg and Poland as well as the UK, recently completed two major deals elsewhere in the country in Manchester and at Wakefield It will open a 217,350 sq ft industrial and logistics complex at the Airport City Manchester development, which is available for other firms to occupy early next year.

Another industrial and distribution facility will open at the Premier Logistics Park in Wakefield.

Its role is to develop warehouses and at the Wakefield site it provides space for Royal Mail and haulage firm Kuehne & Nagel, while its other clients include TK Maxx, DHL and Argos.

Mountpark also offers working yards, car parks, and security services.

There are high hopes for the number of jobs the new businesses would bring with them to Southampton, with Mountpark director Philip O’Callaghan saying it should be “in the high hundreds”.

He said: “We have already started engaging with Southampton City Council and over the course of the first few months of next year we will continue negotiations over a planning application.

“It’s a major employment site and it’s fair to say our plans will fit in with that.”

And, he said, the firm does not want to hang around with the development, aiming to hand in a planning application between April and June, and then starting work later in the summer or autumn.

It is hoped the first units on the site will be up and running in the early months of 2017.

He continued: “We plan to get on and start building, we think it’s an excellent opportunity and there are potential tenants out in the market so we are confident we can get on and start building once we have detailed planning permission.”

When asked about employment he said: “It’s going to be very significant, we are already talking to one or two people and it’s going to be in the high hundreds.

“They are going to be very high quality and high specification units, so they will appeal to everyone in the market and there are a number of tenants looking for those units. Between the directors of the company we have more than 200 years of experience and since we formed the joint venture we have purchased eight sites across Europe.

“This is our fourth in the UK. Between us we have a very significant track record of regenerating sites both for employment and mixed use. It is very exciting.”

City council leader Simon Letts has welcomed the news, saying: “They don’t want to sit on an empty site, they want to get on with it.

“I’m absolutely delighted because what we don’t want is an empty site to sit there, and the Government to turn around and say that because there’s nothing there there should be housing.

“The principle was to create employment and I’m delighted that we seem to have achieved that.”