Rupert Murdoch is demanding that twice as many cycle spaces as specified are installed in his new London headquarters at London Bridge.

There will now be more than 500 slots instead of the 264 allowed for by developer Irvine Sellar in the 16-storey block, which is capable of holding more than 3000 staff. That should give other developers pause for thought — the thought being “how much valuable rentable space do I have to give up to accommodate these pesky cyclists?”

“This is virgin territory,” says Mark McAlister of Colliers, who helped let the 428,000 sq ft The Place to News UK. “Far more people are cycling to work in London than ever anticipated. I’m not sure architects have caught up with need to provide space for bikes. Developers find themselves being bullied by tenants into giving over valuable office rental space to bike racks and showers.”

How much is being given up rests on a series of assumptions. Let’s say office floors rent at £50 a square foot and cycle space at £25, and that each bike takes up 20 square feet. The annual loss of rental income per bike is therefore £500. That cuts roughly £10,000 off the value of the property. Yes, per bike.

Google sets a searching task

Howls of frustration? Stifled anger? These are two guesses at the reactions of developer Argent to the news this week that Google is to revise plans to build offices for 4500 staff at King’s Cross, delaying completion of the £650 million project by a year to 2017.

Frustration because it took Google the gestation period of an elephant from deciding to move to King’s Cross in early 2011 to buying a 2.4-acre block of land in early 2013. Anger because the much-lauded plans drawn up by Allford Hall Monaghan Morris received planning permission just two months ago.

Feelings will be mollified by Google’s promise to take even more space in already designed buildings nearby. Joe Borrett, head of real estate at the search engine giant, says of the delayed project: “We want to challenge ourselves to do something even better.”

Challenging others, yet again, surely?

* Fancy a flat above a burger bar in the Strand? Yours for £4 million.

As the price suggests, the apartments being developed by Simon Lyons and Farid Alizadeh of Enstar Capital and property veteran Sir John Beckwith are pretty fancy.

The £22.5 million scheme next to the Adelphi Theatre includes a Byron burger restaurant. Each of the four flats close to The Savoy is the size of a four-bedroom home. They will be priced at £2300 per square foot. History included .

An application has been made to Westminster council to have a green plaque fixed to Gatti House, which is named after Sir John Gatti, Mayor of Westminster in 1911-12, who owned a restaurant on the site. His 1897 menu shows roast beef priced at one shilling. At that time, £4 million would have bought you Devonshire House opposite The Ritz. It’s on sale today for £400 million.