Meydan to build Emirates Airline pilots’ village

Construction has begun on the newly branded Meydan Avenue – previously known as Diamond Business Park – which sits in the shadows of The Meydan Hotel, Racecourse and Grandstand. Courtesy Meydan

Meydan, the private developer behind the world’s largest horse racing complex, yesterday unveiled plans to build an airline pilots’ village as part of the second phase of the Dh21 billion Mohammed bin Rashid City megaproject in Dubai.

Mohammed bin Rashid City – District Eleven, a collection of 1,500 four-bedroom semi-detached villas spanning a total of 450,000 square metres, will be let to Emirates Airline pilots.

Separately Meydan will also build 700 four-bedroom villas for sale comprising another 210,000 square metres.

The project, next to Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Road and Al Ain Road, will also include a new private school, Kent College Canterbury – Meydan, a tie-up between Meydan and the Mir Hashem Khoory group.

The school will specialise in equestrian training and will eventually accommodate up to 2,000 students from year 1 to 12 based around the British curriculum, Meydan said.

The company declined to say how much the project would cost to build.

“District Eleven will become a sought-after suburban community in Dubai as we bring in outstanding education facilities, complemented by one-of-a-kind landscaping and green space,” said the Meydan chairman Saeed Humaid Al Tayer.

At last year's Cityscape, Meydan and the Indian developer Sobha announced that they would be building the first phase of Mohammed bin Rashid City – 1,500 luxury villas set in 1,100 acres of parkland around the world's biggest man-made lagoon – known as District One.

The Mohammed bin Rashid City project, located between Sheikh Zayed Road, Emirates Road and Al Khail Road, was announced in November 2012. At the time it was slated to comprise the world’s biggest shopping mall dubbed the Mall of the World and more than 100 hotels.

However, since then the task of building the Mall of the World has been passed to the government conglomerate Dubai Properties and located on land it owns off the Sheikh Zayed Road.

Speaking at a press conference at Cityscape yesterday, Khalfan Bel Houl, vice president for strategy at Dubai Holding, told reporters that the first phase of the Dh25bn Mall of the World will be complete three years from the moment construction work starts on the site.

However, he declined to give any details as to how the megaproject would be funded or what elements from the master plan would be included in the first phase.

He added that 180 million shoppers would visit the mall each year.

The MBR City project, which was announced by Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid, Vice President of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, in November, represents a revival of a similar Mohammed bin Rashid Gardens project, which was first announced in 2008 but never came off the drawing board because of the global financial crisis.

The 2008 master plan had suggested the Gardens project would cover 74 square kilometres and cost US$60bn.

Follow The National's Business section on Twitter