Cork developer Bridgewater to build 700 homes in €400m Waterfall Rd expansion
Waterfall Rd is transiting from largely undeveloped land into a substantial residential zone.
A land deal worth €7m has paved the way for Cork developer Bridgewater Homes to ramp up its house-building activity on Waterfall Rd, in a series of residential schemes valued at just under €400m.
The latest acquisition strengthens the company’s foothold in one of the city’s increasingly active suburban growth corridors and positions it to deliver close to 700 new homes in the coming years.
Bridgewater’s focus is centred on lands at Ardarostig, on the city end of Waterfall Rd, where the developer has already established a presence through its now almost complete 275-unit Waterfall Heights scheme.
The scale of Bridgewater’s Ardarostig programme is the largest residential development in the city’s western suburbs in several decades.
The developer’s interest in Waterfall Rd goes back to 2023 when it acquired the Waterfall Heights site for €10.4m from Dublin-based developer Ardstone.
Ardstone itself had purchased the land in 2018 for €6.2m from builders’ providers Grafton Group, trading locally as Heaton Buckley. That earlier deal laid the groundwork for transforming what was an area of largely undeveloped land into what is now becoming a substantial residential zone.
Bridgewater’s latest deal expands its footprint even further. The developer recently secured an additional 8.5-acre parcel directly opposite Waterfall Heights in a €7m transaction with Dwellings Developments Bishopstown Ltd.
The sale was overseen by Cork auctioneers Frank V Murphy & Co, and the site came with the benefit of full planning permission for 164 homes.
Work is already underway on this development, which will be marketed as Waterfall Avenue. According to Bridgewater director Dave Walsh, the scheme is expected to be completed by summer 2027.
A third major project, known as Waterfall Manor, has also just received planning approval. This scheme will consist of 246 homes on a 13.5-acre site located just east of Waterfall Heights.
Bridgewater intends to break ground on the Manor development in June, with a projected build programme of between two and three years. Once completed, the three Waterfall Rd projects combined will form a substantial residential cluster in what was a predominantly rural area.
Bridgewater aims to deliver a diverse mix of housing types across all three schemes, designed to appeal to a broad range of buyers.
The developments include apartment blocks, duplexes, townhouses and semi-Ds. All units are intended for private sale. The location, approximately 1.4 km southwest of Bishopstown and situated between Dunnes Stores and Marymount Hospice, along the N40 corridor, is near major transport routes and third-level education institutes.
Shane Finn of DNG O’Connor Finn is the agent selling the Waterfall Avenue homes and he said 54 of the apartments in the scheme will be available through Croí Cónaithe, which means reduced prices for home buyers.
Demand for the as-yet unbuilt homes is huge: Between the first phase release on December 22 and January 5, Mr Finn received just under 600 enquiries. All 35 first-release homes are now sold, with a phase two release expected in the next two weeks.
Mr Finn said the appetite for new homes had not changed since he launched Waterfall Heights back in July 2023.
“I remember 19 people slept in cars the night before, so that they would be the first into the site offices for the launch. There were no houses to see, and I sold 36 that day,” he said. “I expect the uptake across the road, at Waterfall Avenue, to be exactly the same.”
Bridgewater’s Waterfall project is its most ambitious since it was set up in 2020, operating from its office on South Douglas Rd.
In the past six years, it has steadily expanded its development pipeline across Cork. Beyond Waterfall Rd, the company has planning permission for 362 homes at Mountain Rd in Kilmoney, Carrigaline, where construction is expected to begin shortly.
It has also lodged a planning application with Cork City Council for a 176-home development at Maryborough Ridge in Moneygourney, with a decision due later this month. The company is also working on a planning application for a large scale residential development involving 300-plus homes in Castletreasure. Mr Walsh said they expect that application to be lodged “in a few months”.
Closer to the city, near the Fingerpost roundabout on Rochestown Rd, Bridgewater is currently constructing 19 homes on a compact 1.19-acre site adjacent to Douglas Court shopping centre, which it acquired for about €1.75m last year. Homes in the niche scheme are already being reserved.
Other Bridgewater schemes include 98-unit Glenwood, in Strawhall, Fermoy, where the last unit has just been sold and under construction Ocean Drive in Ballycotton, an exclusive development of four-bed detached homes. The developer has also built 21 homes at Arlington in Kerry Pike and 61 homes in Lisnagar Gardens, Rathcormac, Co Cork.
“Between what we have under construction and in planning and conception stage, we have more than 3,500 units in our pipeline, Mr Walsh said.
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