Kent Station revamp will transform Horgans Quay
Agents Lisney have been appointed now, for a second bid to secure a joint developer for the prime, river-fronting six acres and city end portion of the company’s much larger Horgans Quay holding, where redevelopment prospects have been touted for more than 20 years.
Already, CIE is working on-site, developing a new car park onto Horgan’s Quay, finally moving on its long-held plans to reorient the busy rail station’s access away from Lower Glanmire Road and to make easier, shorter, pedestrian, taxi and commuter access to the city centre and to the bus station.
The site now being offered for development for possible new uses for offices, hotel or multi-unit residential and some retail will benefit from that station’s new interchange/reorientation, increased passing traffic and infrastructure investment.
CIE is seeking a development partner on the Cork site, along similar lines to the way it last year offered and secured Treasury Holdings’ developer Johnny Rohan for a site at Tara Street Station, where Mr Ronan plans a 22 storey office tower in a €130m investment.
CIE will be entitled to a percentage of the rent roll in return for the site, on a long lease with seven-year licence allowed in the run-up to securing planning, and tenanting the building.
Now comes a second bid by CIE to pair up with a developer in Cork as it had offered this site last October with different agents, with a December 2015 deadline date for tenders.
It’s understood a number were received, but the process now is starting once more, via Margaret Kelleher and Edward Hanafin of Lisney, who describe it as “a significant waterfront development opportunity adjacent to Kent Station, adjoining the new station interchange and public transport roadway, currently under construction”.
As it’s not a direct sale, Lisney note that CIE seek an income stream and to participate in an income sharing arrangement with the successful tenderer on this Horgan’s Quay site, with a 300-year ground lease offered for an annual rent, or, alternatively, 10% of the market rent achieved from the development once completed, whichever is the greater.
The Development Plan stipulates building heights in the north section of four to six storeys, and a maximum of seven fronting the river.
Current zoning is for mixed-use development to ensure a vibrant urban area, “working in tandem with the principles of sustainable development, transportation and self-sufficiency”.
It’s in close proximity to an evolving new central business district downriver, including City Quarter, One Albert Quay and the Port of Cork site, expected to come to market formally in coming months via DTZ, but currently delayed.
Economic recovery, and the succes of One Albert Quay, has prompted renewed Cork Dockland development and other sites now looking to supply offices include Owen O’Callaghan’s site (previously ear-marked for an events centre) on Albert Quay, facing Horgans’ Quay — a site Mr O’Callaghan himself had identified as one of Cork’s very best, some 20 years ago.
Closing date for tenders is June 2, 2016.
: Lisney 021-4275079
