The first occupants of the new Riverwalk development in the National Digital Park at Citywest, research company AC Nielsen and mobile phone operator Meteor, moved into their new offices this week.
Described as the St Stephen's Green of Citywest Business Campus, Riverwalk is a development of some 30,000 sq m (323,000 sq ft) of space in nine individual buildings grouped around a pedestrian street, piazza and central river. Its design was inspired by the distinctive canals of San Antonio and Utrecht and it will include retail and leisure facilities for all of Citywest.
The first four buildings are nearing completion and are all due to be finished by the end of this year. The first of the three-storey buildings to be completed, 14 and 16 Riverwalk, is now occupied by AC Nielsen and Meteor who moved in on October 1st.
Nielsen, best known for providing the TAM ratings for television programme viewing, has taken 1,115 sq m (12,000 sq ft) and Meteor is occupying 1,719 sq m (18,500 sq ft). Nielsen is relocating to the National Digital Park from Mount Street in Dublin. "AC Nielsen is very pleased with its new facility and is happy to be moving to the National Digital Park and Citywest," according to Arthur Ryan of Colliers Jackson-Stops, who represented the company.
Meteor already has another facility in Citywest and is using the new space for its customer services centre and administration.
The buildings under construction also include one which will house a bar, restaurant and banking facilities from next spring. A new amenity building is being built, which will house a 186 sq m (2,000 sq ft) convenience store and two smaller retail outlets of 70 sq m (750 sq ft) each.
Elsewhere in Citywest, a crΦche is being built with space for 110 children, adding to the growing number of facilities becoming available to the 4,000 people who already work on the campus.
Riverwalk is part of an integrated design for the National Digital Park by the international firm of architects, Building Design Partnership.
The park covers 100 acres at Citywest and is a joint venture between Davy Hickey Properties, the developer of Citywest, and IDA Ireland.
It is designated as the national centre for e-commerce and, at its heart, has a Global Crossing transAtlantic fibre optic cable linking it to 22 cities worldwide with a capacity of 279 GB per second.
"The layout of the buildings at Riverwalk means that they can accommodate all sizes of companies looking for upwards of 500 sq m (5,382 sq ft) of space," says Fionnuala ╙ Buachalla of Jones Lang LaSalle which represents Citywest Business Campus and the National Digital Park. Current rents are £16.75 (€21.27) per sq ft with parking spaces at £450 (€571.38) a year.
"Riverwalk is a superb place to work, carefully designed to achieve a pleasant atmosphere and provide all the facilities one would need.
"It even has its own microclimate, created by glazing the links between the buildings on the west side in order to allow in the sun and keep out the prevailing wind."
