Work progressing at Dubai’s Culture Village project

Manazel Al Khor to be delivered by end of this year and the Dh800 million Dubai Wharf is expected to complete in phases throughout 2017.

The 557,000-square-foot mixed-use Manazel Al Khor is 82 per cent complete, and the one- to four-bedroom apartments are set for handover by the end of this year. Jeffrey E Biteng / The National

Dubai Properties’ (DP) long-running Culture Village project is picking up pace, with the construction of Manazel Al Khor set for completion this year.

The 557,000-square-foot mixed-use building, containing ground-floor retail and 98 apartments, is 82 per cent complete, and the one- to four-bedroom apartments are set for handover by the end of this year, the developer said.

Across the road, Engineering Contracting Company is making progress on DP’s Dh800m Dubai Wharf scheme. It contains 270,000 sq ft of leasable space split between 110 units on two levels, and 582 apartments.

Tower 1 has 128 units, Tower 3 has 128 units and Tower 2, which is actually three separate buildings, contains 254 units. All three of these will be completed by the end of the first quarter of next year.

A fourth tower, Tower 4, was launched later and will be completed by the end of next year. The retail units will be ready between the third and fourth quarter of the year, a DP representative said.

Culture Village was initially launched in 2006 at Dubai’s creekside, and many of the plots in the area were sold to third-party developers in 2005-06. They are being built around a 6 kilometre boardwalk and a marina.

Plans for a Middle East Museum of Modern Art at the site were also announced in 2008, but much of the infrastructure remained undeveloped when the scheme was relaunched at Cityscape Global in 2013.

Work started at both Manazel Al Khor and Dubai Wharf in the following year, when a deal to build a 290-room Anatara hotel on the site was also announced.

Enshaa Capital had also made progress on two of its projects at Culture Village – the creekside D1 tower and the Palazzo Versace hotel and serviced residences.

A mosque and substations at the site have since been delivered and a landscaping contractor recently appointed.

DP said that infrastructure work was under way across the development and would be phased to coincide with building completions.

A new access road to the project from Sheikh Rashid Road has been approved by the Roads and Transport Authority.

Access and stops are also planned for RTA water taxis, and plans for the scheme’s marina are being reconfigured to let it handle larger boats.

Meanwhile, 92 per cent of piling work for the Anantara Hotel is complete and a contractor will be appointed within the next quarter, with a view for a mid-2019 opening.

Abdulla Abushabib, a director of customer and government relations at Dubai Properties, said that despite the fact that many third-party developers bought plots in 2005-06, none had defaulted and many projects were underway.

“They all were committed and [are] still interested in investing,” he said.

Indeed, a handful have completed and several others are currently in progress, including Riah Tower, which was recently bought by the developer Radiant Star.

Mr Abushabib said that as the master developer, DP had recently received several design approval requests from third-party developers.

“So we are expecting a good number of projects coming under development.”

Enshaa Capital said that the handover of units at D1 Tower – an 80-storey residential building containing 518 apartments – began in September last year. The neighbouring Palazzo Versace hotel also opened its doors for a soft-launch phase in November. A spokesman said that the date of its official opening “will be announced soon”.

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