Site Visit
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arlier this year, Nakheel, a Dubaibased master developer, released its financial results for the first quarter of 2018. Chairman Ali Rashid Lootah hailed an impressive start to the year, with a net profit of $420 million. Since the start of the year, the company has signed construction contracts worth $1.36bn, including a $1.14bn contract for Deira Mall at Deira Islands and a $105m contract for its first joint venture on the same project – an 800-room beachfront hotel and waterpark with Spain’s RIU Hotels and Resorts. Deira Islands figures
prominently in the developer’s thoughts, with the massive master project seeing numerous multi-million-dollar contracts awarded over the course of the last year. These include four contracts worth a collective $117m for infrastructure projects around Islands A and B: a sewage treatment plant, a district cooling plant, a substation and piling work for the resort. At the time, Nakheel said it had invested more than $2bn in infrastructure and construction contracts for Deira Islands. Almost a year down the line, work on these infrastructure projects is now in full swing, and Big Project ME was invited on an exclusive tour of the works with Shatha Al Suwaidi, director of Infrastructure Projects at Nakheel Projects Construction. “We’ve completed Stage One of infrastructure works, which is two lanes of the main
StAtS: 15.3sqkm – Total size of the Deira Island master development 40km – Coastline that is being added to Dubai 21km – Beachfront to Dubai 40 – Number of hotel plots already sold 6 – Number of marinas being built at a total cost of $45 million $272 million – Cost of infrastructure works at Deira Islands $2.31 billion – Total amount invested by Nakheel into construction and infrastructure development, so far
road around the island and the successful completion of the sewage network,” she relates during a drive around the various projects, which also includes the construction of four substations. “Stage Two has started already. We’re progressing a lot on this side. We’ve had the asphalt laying done, and our milestone is to finish the infrastructure near the Night Market first, since it’s the first retail project to be launched – it’s due for completion towards the end of this year.” She explains that as master developer, Nakheel has been involved with the infrastructure works project right from the beginning, taking it from planning to design with the infrastructure consultants, all the way through to the tender process and the hiring of the contractor. “Our role is to monitor and supervise the construction activities on the site and manage
Working to deadline Nakheel intends to complete infrastructure work near the Night Market before the retail project is launched at the end of 2018.
“There’s a lot of construction happening now, and a lot of contractors involved. The coordination with these people has increased on a technical level. That’s because we’re doing the infrastructure work, and the infrastructure is going all around the island” 26 June 2018
