The initiator and developer of the project is Prostranstvo corporate group. The company is engaged in the development, engineering, design, and construction.

“The economy of Odesa was developing through logistics, first of all, maritime one. But nowadays, technologies become a growth driver all over the world. Today, in Odesa, four times fewer IT professionals live and work than in Lviv, where the appropriate conditions have already been formed. Our goal is to create such an environment in Odesa. Therefore, we are building ITown not just as a set of offices, coworking spaces, and apartment buildings. This place is destined to become an agent of the city and region development,” comments Andrey Semenov, the project manager.

Where and when does ITown start

iTown is located between Prymorska and Sofiivska Streets in the central part of Odesa.

The park is planned to be fully completed in the 4th quarter of 2023. A 24-story building with offices (14 floors) and apartments (9 floors) will be put into operation first (tentatively in 2021-2022). There will be a restaurant on the top floor. The building is designed in such a way that the visitor of the office or restaurant will not be able to be on the residential floors.

How much will the apartments cost

According to the project representatives, the sale of the apartments has already started. Now the cost per square meter of living space is from $935.

The apartments will be rented out with complete refurbishment, kitchen furniture, and equipped bathroom.

Business part

Three extensible coworking spaces are planned in ITown.

According to Semenov, already at the design stage, ITown confirmed the opening of 3 representative offices of global tech brands and 6 Odessa-based tech companies. There are about 20 more companies in the process of negotiations.

What else

• Residential buildings will be equipped with smart systems that will know where a person needs to get to before one enters. Non-contact sensors will open the doors themselves, and the elevator will ‘understand’ which floor to go to.
• The biometric identification system will allow getting into the apartment even if the person has lost the keys.
• Given the global pandemic, everything in ITown is made to minimize the contact of hands with different surfaces in public areas.
• Only rainwater will be used for irrigation and household needs. For this purpose, a rainwater harvesting, filtration, and storage station will be installed.

Also, ITown is planning to equip a winter garden with sea views, a parking lot for 500 cars, a fitness center, a kindergarten, a cinema, IT schools, shops, etc.

• This is the third city in Ukraine, where the service is currently operating. Uber Eats also operates in Kyiv and Lviv.
• You can register as a courier in Odesa by clicking here.
• The income can be about 850 UAH per day.
• For some time, the service will work only in the central districts of the city. Later the coverage area will be extended.

Uber Eats is a food delivery platform created by Uber. Under the current name, the service was launched in 2015 and currently operates in dozens of cities in Europe, Asia, North, and South America. The service was launched in Ukraine on February 6, 2018.

The main competitor of Uber Eats – Glovo service – has been working in Odesa since April this year. In total, Glovo operates in 11 cities in Ukraine.

The rates are as follows:

With promo code HELLOODESA, users receive a discount of 60 UAH for the first trip.

Odesa became the fourth city where Bolt has been launched. The service also operates in Kyiv and Kharkiv. Recently, it has started its operation in Lviv as well.

Phonster Z is a case for smartphone and other things, made of eco-leather in the style of the holster. In the new version, the AGE team changed the back surface of Phonster, added metal parts for a more secure fit, improved the cover length adjustment mechanism, and also made it waterproof.

In addition, AGE has released the Phonster Z Tablet bag, which can be worn on the chest or over the shoulder. Its main feature is size. It contains not only a smartphone, but also a paverbank, documents, a charger, a notebook, documents, office supplies, and so on.

Prices for new items start from $13 up to $790. Deliveries are scheduled for May 2019.

The overall assessment consists of 8 indicators:

• purchasing ability index (the higher, the better);
• pollution index (the lower, the better);
• the ratio of the cost of housing and earnings (the lower, the better);
• cost of living in the city (the lower, the better);
• safety index (the higher, the better);
• health care quality index (the higher, the better);
• an index of time spent for trips (the lower, the better);
• climate comfort index (the higher, the better).

New York indicators were taken as the benchmark for estimating the cost of living. The index includes the cost of rent, the general price level for consumer goods, the cost of food, the high cost of restaurants and local purchasing ability.

For example, if the index of a city on rental housing is 120, then renting an apartment there is 20% more expensive than in New York. More details on the Numbeo methodology can be found on a separate page.

As of the beginning of 2019, Lviv was recognized as the most comfortable city in Ukraine. The city is on 174th place out of 226. In total, 5 Ukrainian cities were included in the rating and almost all of them have deteriorated since the last final assessment, conducted in mid-2018:

• Lviv, 174th place (previously – 165th place);
• Kyiv, 192nd place (previously – 174th place);
• Odesa, 193rd place (not previously evaluated);
• Kharkiv, 195th place (previously – 167th place)
• Dnipro, 201st place (not previously evaluated).

Map of the participating cities. Ukrainian cities – mainly in the “yellow” zone.

Canberra, the capital of Australia, was recognized as the best city to live in. The worst is the capital of Venezuela, the city of Caracas. A complete list and ratings can be found on the Numbeo website.

The most common reason for Ukraine’s weak position is low purchasing ability. Kharkiv, Odesa, Lviv and Dnipro were in the list of 20 worst cities by this indicator. However, the total costs (cost of living) are small: Lviv, Kharkiv, Dnipro and Odesa were included in the top 20 cheapest cities. At the same time, Dnipro closed the list of top 20 most polluted cities.