WORK is set to start next spring on an ultra-modern �6million headquarters for a fast-growing transport firm – and will create more than 100 jobs.

Planners have given the go-ahead for leading cargo company Maritime Transport Ltd and landowners Trinity College, Cambridge, to carry out the project, which designers say will create a landmark building to mark the approaches to Britain’s top port.

Tim Collins, partner in Bidwells, agent for Trinity College and managers of its Trimley Estate, said the college had agreed terms with the company and detailed discussions are now taking place to finalise the design, with the hope of a start on work in March next year.

“The college has been at great pains to ensure that the quality of the design for this project is to a very high standard and believe that this will be delivered,” he said.

“This is an exciting proposal from an important Felixstowe-based business which will deliver good quality offices to this gateway site adjoining the A14 and enable them to concentrate their various Felixstowe interests in close proximity on the estate.”

The offices will be built in Clickett Hill Road on the lowest of the plateaux on the 170-acre Clickett Hill site.

The sweeping five-storey curved building will have 3,240 sq metres of offices, plus modern washrooms and showers, a rest room with TV and Wifi for the 300-plus Maritime Transport truck drivers who visit the Port of Felixstowe every day.

Also on the HQ’s 2.5-acre site will be parking for more than 200 cars.

It will have capacity for 250 staff, initially housing the company’s 70 employees from its three sites around the Felixstowe port area plus creating 130 new full-time jobs straight away.

Maritime Transport Ltd only moved into its current offices on the Haven Exchange site in Felixstowe six years ago, but says it has outgrown them already because its business is growing so quickly.

“The development of new headquarters in Felixstowe is now an essential requirement for the business and important to the town as a source of future employment,” said the company.

“Crucially, a number of important functions are now spread over three separate locations around the port and it is imperative that these are brought together under one roof.”