Woodford Business Park

Office & Business Park:

Woodford Business Park comprises of a combination of business/service units, small and large scale offices and limited warehousing. McMullan & Co. were appointed,prior to the acquisition of the site, to assess its feasibility as a business park in an area where most commercial units were either warehousing or distribution units.

Of particular relevance to the site was the existence of a “Red Safety Area” (RSA) relating to one of the runways from Dublin airport. While the Irish Aviation Authority(IAA) had no objection in principle to developing a Business Park under the RSA, Aer Rianta objected.

The critical element was the potential risk to the increased number of people working in a business park when compared to a warehouse or distribution centre. McMullan & Co involved an aviation specialist and carried out considerable research into public sector safety zones for runways. It was established that the RSA was a legacy of a standard that had been adopted more than 50 years previously by the International Civil Aviation Organisation but had now been replaced in Europe and elsewhere by public safety zones which were of a fundamentally different size and shape and which would have no impact. It was also understood that the IAA were generally assessing planning applications according to these new public safety zones and in due course it was likely that the Development Plan would be amended to reflect this.

McMullan & Co then obtained initial planning permission and initiated development of the lands, based on business park use for a first phase for the area which was outside the RSA, and based on warehousing use for the area which was within the RSA. Subsequently a new permission was obtained for Business Park use, comprising mainly large offices, for those lands within the RSA.

McMullan & Co provided all the professional services for implementing the project with the exception of quantity surveying and aviation specialist advice.