A Unique Opportunity for Waterford

Illustration of Potential Scale of Proposed North Quays Development

Waterford City has been constrained in its growth by an absence of key infrastructure, particularly in respect of its river crossings and City Centre access. As a consequence its development has been compromised, leading to a less sustainable City Centre that is not delivering on its economic potential.

• Down the full document – “Transforming Waterford” – an integrated transport proposal for Waterford

The City is, however, transforming from a historical manufacturing and port city to one where advanced manufacturing and knowledge based industries can marry with a significantly enhanced service sector, particularly in tourism and retail, to deliver an urban centre that can be a real driver for regional development and a centre of consequence in the National picture.

There is now a unique opportunity for City transformation on foot of the delivery of the City By-pass, the designation of the North Quays as a Strategic Development Zone and urban regeneration completed or underway. A finite public investment of €61.5 million in tandem with redevelopment of the North Quays will unlock Waterford’s potential and will deliver

• A redevelopment of the North Quays, the iconic Ard Rí and Michael Street sites
• A unique pedestrian friendly City Centre
• A City with the only truly integrated transport hub
• A dedicated walking and cycling route traversing through the whole City

The immediate benefit will see 1,000 construction jobs and 2,300 permanent jobs in retail, tourism and knowledge based enterprise but this will pale in comparison to the future potential delivery by way of

• the opening up of development in the Northside and
• the rebranding of the City through the elimination of the blight of dereliction on one whole face of the City Centre.

These combined developments will be a catalyst for the transformation of Waterford and
will see the delivery of the largest single regeneration project in this country, representing
a combined investment of €562 Million.  Public sector investment of €61.5 Million spread over three years is not small, even in National terms, but the yield is significant. The Economic Appraisal prepared by Indecon, and appended to the full document, outlines the positive rate of return, based primarily on immediate economic yields from the redeveloped the North Quays, Michael Street and Ard Rí sites where there are developer commitments in place. The benefit to cost ratio in present day terms relative to a do
nothing scenario is determined as delivering a cost/benefit ratio of 2.1.