Business | Property
Developers line up to grab plots in Arabian Canal project
Developers are already showing an interest in snapping up plots in the huge Arabian Canal mega-project, which was unveiled on Tuesday by real estate developer Limitless.
- By Robert Ditcham, Staff Reporter
- Published: 23:51 October 10, 2007
- Image Credit: Supplied Picture
- Arabian Canal comprises two main parts, an $11 billion canal that will run along a 75 km U-shaped route from Dubai Waterfront to Palm Jumeirah, and a $50 billion waterfront 'city'.
Dubai: Developers are already showing an interest in snapping up plots in the huge Arabian Canal mega-project, which was unveiled on Tuesday by real estate developer Limitless.
The vast project is made up of two main parts, an $11 billion canal which will run along a 75 km U-shaped route from Dubai Waterfront to Palm Jumeirah and a $50 billion waterfront 'city', which will cover 33 km of the waterway's southern stretch.
Ian Raine, development manager of Arabian Canal, told Gulf News that Limitless will act as master developer for the waterfront city, setting up the transport and utilities infrastructure and putting up its own buildings, but selling the majority of the space to private developers to construct their own projects.
"We will develop a percentage of the project ourselves, but the majority of the land will be sold to third parties. We've already had quite a bit of interest from both local and international third party developers," he said.
However, Raine said plots within phase one of the project are not expected to go on sale until mid-2008.
The waterfront city will be built in several phases over 15 years, with construction work expected to start towards the end of 2008.
Raine said Limitless will develop the infrastructure phase by phase, making the land ready for private developers to build approved offices blocks, residential units, retail space and hospitality and entertainment projects.
He added that Limitless is on the verge of moving from a concept stage to begin detailed planning of phase one.
"We have selected a 1,100 hectare area, which we will announce shortly. It will be roughly six per cent of the overall project."
Schedule
Meanwhile, construction on the $11 billion canal is scheduled to start in December and last three years.
Limitless will manage the design and construction of the project, which the company has described as the Middle East's biggest civil engineering project.
It will flow inland from Dubai Waterfront, passing to the east of the new Dubai World Central International Airport before turning back towards Palm Jumeirah, passing through several other Dubai property developments along the way.
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