The Dublin consortium which developed Dublin's Jervis Centre has lodged an application to build a £20 million business park on a 3.5 acre site just off Belfast city centre.
The proposal is for a total of 250,000 sq. ft of office space on the site of the Boxmore cardboard and packaging factory on Durham Street, a couple of minutes' walk from the City Hall.
The site adjoins the city's Westlink ring road. The development is to be called Citylink Business Park.
The proposed development is for a total of 11 separate buildings, some in own-door office format, showrooms, a purpose-built call centre and underground car-parking. The units will be between 6,000 and 67,000 sq. ft.
The area around the Boxmore factory, between the city centre and the Ring Road, has been in decline for decades, with virtually no development - this despite its strategic location beside the Ring Road, bus and rail terminals on the "Golden Mile" along Great Victoria Street and the prime retail area of the city centre.
Boxmore is moving its operations to an industrial site north of the city in Mallusk.
The consortium behind the scheme successfully developed the Mays Meadow site, of about four acres in the Laganside area.
The office building completed last year in Mays Meadows has been let with Abbey National as sole tenant and was sold recently by agents Lambert Smith Hampton for around £10 million.
There are further office and leisure developments under way on the Mays Meadow site.
The same group is also involved in the restoration of a listed 19th century building in Belfast's Victoria Street. It will have 13,500 sq. ft of modern office space around the building's original glazed dome entrance hall.
Agents Lambert Smith Hampton report increasing confidence in the office market with consistently rising rentals for the first time in almost two decades.
Jago Bret, head of Business Space, of Lambert Smith Hampton said: "The Belfast office market is more buoyant than it has been for many years with increasing interest in the province from inward investors, particularly in relation to call centres and IT/software development."
