The University of Barcelona (UB) continues to strengthen its Diagonal Campus. While awaiting the concretization of the expansion of Hospital Clínic on its sports fields, the institution has announced the construction of two buildings that will serve to boost training and research in disciplines such as mathematics, computer science, economics, and health. The new blocks will add 24,000 square meters, with the forecast of hosting more than 700 researchers and 45 research groups.
"Today we witness a historic day," said the rector of the UB, Joan Guàrdia, at the presentation of the institutional agreement with the Government and the Barcelona City Council that makes this growth possible. "Within 15 years, Barcelona will have become even more a pole of attraction for talent and knowledge of first world magnitude and we are adding another piece to make it a reality," he maintained.
In this expansion plan, the first block to be built will be located between Joan Obials and John M. Keynes streets, above the Faculty of Economics and Business. There, the new headquarters of the Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science, of 14,000 square meters, will be built, which will leave the Historic Building in Plaza Universitat. Research groups from the Faculty of Economics and Business are also expected to be installed there.
The second building will allow the expansion of the Barcelona Science Park (PCB), which recently inaugurated the first very high-field nuclear magnetic resonance apparatus, unique in all of Spain and a pioneer in Europe, expanding its capacity to research new therapeutic targets and drugs. In the current headquarters of the School of New Interactive Technologies (ENTI), a 10,000 square meter building will be constructed where research groups from the field of health sciences of the UB and the Institute of Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC) will be located, currently installed in the PCB, along with another research center, the Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB). In parallel to the new headquarters for the IBEC, the science park is approaching full occupancy of its current facilities and is working on the habilitation of the last pending piece, the CUB building.
The future headquarters of Campus Diagonal will be built by the Institut Català del Sòl (Incasòl), with a construction schedule that will extend until 2028. After the UB has ceded the land, the Government will be responsible for executing the works, with an estimated budget of around 50 million euros. The university and the entities that end up locating in the buildings will pay a rent equivalent to the cost of construction. Feder funds may be used to cover the total investment.