An industrial park (also known as industrial estate, trading estate) is an area zoned and planned for the purpose of industrial development. An industrial park can be thought of as a more “heavyweight” version of a business park or office park, which has offices and light industry, rather than heavy industry.
Industrial parks are usually located on the edges of, or outside, the main residential area of a city, and are normally provided with good transportation access, including road and rail. Industrial parks are usually located close to transport facilities, especially where more than one transport modes coincide, including highways, railroads, airports and ports. Another common feature of a North American industrial park is a water tower, which helps to hold enough water to meet the park’s demands and for firefighting purposes, and also advertises the industrial park and locality, as usually the community’s name and logo are painted onto its surface.
This idea of setting land aside through this type of zoning has several purposes, by concentrating dedicated infrastructure in a delimited area, to reduce the per-business cost of that infrastructure. Such infrastructure includes roadways, railroad sidings, ports, high-power electric supplies (often including three-phase electric power), high-end communications cables, large-volume water supplies, and high-volume gas lines. To attract new business by providing an integrated infrastructure in one location.
