Business park

A business park in Santa Barbara County, California

For a property containing a group of businesses, see serviced office.

A business park or business estate is an area of land in which many office buildings are grouped together. All of the work that goes on is commercial, not industrial or residential. These are popular in many suburban locations, where it is cheaper to develop land because of the lower land costs and the lower building costs for building wider, not necessarily higher. They are also often located near motorways or main roads. Criticism of business parks often relates to the failure of business parks to relate to the urban fabric of the city:

A result of this form of territorial colonization is the proliferation of spaces which escape the control of the built realm: voids between fragments of unconnected residential schemes, gaps between urbanized zones, abandoned farmland, etc. While we debate on whether the traditional city block is a näive solution to the problem of ordering immediate periphery, a new approach to spacial organization arises with the ease that characterizes any new consumer good, an approach which questions the conventional references of urbanism: the so-called 'commercial, industrial, business and theme park'. ...

The urbanized park originally sprang the hybridization of the garden-city and Anglo-Saxon university campus models. It adopted the former's low-rise buildings and attention to free spaces as a way of shaping the environment, and the latter's autonomous constructions. In sum, parks are thematic precincts of autonomous architectural set pieces arranged around parking lots and communal services, and are situated at the most accessible points of the metropolitan road network.

(José María Eaquiaga (November–December 1998). "The City: Folds and Pieces". AV Monographs. 74: 4–11.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: date format (link) CS1 maint: year (link))

List of significant business parks (incomplete)

Suburban office parks like the T-REX Corporate Center in Boca Raton, Florida are usually lushly landscaped conveying a peaceful workspace.

• Bulgaria
  • Business Park Sofia
• Germany
  • Business Park Regensburg
• Ireland
  • East Point Business Park, Dublin
• Poland
  • Kraków Business Park, Zabierzów
• Singapore
  • Changi Business Park
  • International Business Park
• United Kingdom
  • Aztec West, Bristol
  • Birmingham Business Park, Solihull
  • Cambridge Business Park, Cambridge an integral part of Silicon Fen.
  • Cardiff Gate Business Park, Cardiff
  • Edinburgh Park, Edinburgh
  • GreenPark, Reading, Berkshire
  • Milton Park, Oxfordshire
  • Omega, Warrington
  • Pride Park, Derby
  • Shrewsbury Business Park, Shrewsbury
  • Slough Trading Estate, Slough
  • Solent Business Park, Whiteley, Hampshire
  • Solstice Park, Wiltshire
  • Team Valley, Gateshead
  • Thames Valley Park, Reading, Berkshire
• United States
  • Newport Center, Newport Beach, California
  • Denver Tech Center, Denver, Colorado
  • Research Triangle Park, Raleigh/Durham
  • Cummings Research Park, Huntsville, Alabama
  • Great Valley Corporate Center, Malvern, Pennsylvania
  • T-REX Corporate Center, Boca Raton, Florida
  • Arvida Park of Commerce, Boca Raton, Florida

Business parks in popular culture

• A 1999 film Office Space shows a setting in a business park.

See also

• Industrial park
• Science park