French contractor starts work on Abu Dhabi’s Deerfields Town Square

15 January 2010

Shopping mall will be built on the main highway to Dubai

France’s Thinet has started work on the foundations for the estimated AED450m ($122m) Deerfields Town Square mall project in Abu Dhabi.

Thinet is putting in raft foundations for the building, which are used to spread the load of a structure over a large area.

The mall is being built in the Al-Bahia City area outside Abu Dhabi, adjacent to the Sheikh Rashid highway that leads to Dubai.

The 220,000-square-metre mall will have space for more than 200 retailers, including a Carrefour supermarket and a cinema.

It will serve a number of major developments planned in the emirate, such as Al-Raha Beach, Yas Island, Khalifa City, the expanded Abu Dhabi International airport, and the Khalifa Port & Industrial Zone at Taweelah.

The project client, Mubarak & Brothers Property & Financial Investments (MBI), has invited firms to bid by 31 January for contract to build the mall (MEED 5:1:10).

The local National Dewatering has completed the excavation work.

MBI also plans to build residential, commercial and hospitality buildings with a total built-up area of about 100,000 square metres at the site, but they will be developed at a later stage.

The lead consultant is the UK’s RMJM, which will oversee the conceptual design, co-ordination and supervision of the contractors.

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