Qatar’s Private Engineering Office (PEO) has cancelled plans to build the Doha Grand Park project in the centre of the capital city, Doha.

The reasons for the cancellation of the project are unclear, with sources in Doha pointing to a lack of consensus over the design of the scheme and also the government preferring to prioritise the raft of infrastructure projects required in preparation for hosting football’s Fifa World Cup in 2022.

The urban regeneration project was set to involve developing a park similar in design to New York’s Central Park and London’s Hyde Park, in the area of Doha stretching from the Al-Rayyan road to the tennis centre and from the old British embassy to the road leading onto the corniche. The scheme was scheduled to contain food and beverage outlets, a museum and other attractions.

The PEO had selected the local Urbacon International to develop the scheme on a design and build contract.

There has been slow progress with another project planned to regenerate the central area of Doha. The Emir’s Office received design competition entries from three international architects to redevelop the entire cornice earlier in the year, but according to sources within Qatar there has been no further advancement with the project.

Despite the uncertain future of the regeneration schemes, Qatar’s construction market has shown signs of picking up in recent weeks, with contractors being invited to bid for the first five packages tendered for the multi-billion Doha Metro project and invited to prequalify for the contract to build a 19,000-seat multipurpose sports hall, which will be used for basketball, volleyball and handball, if Qatar is successful in its bid to host the Olympic Games in 2020.