The first two communities to be built in Dubai South’s Dh25 billion Residential District went on show at Cityscape on Tuesday, known as The Pulse and The Villages.
Dubai South is the master developer owned by the Dubai Government that is building thousands of homes, shops and offices around the new Al Maktoum International Airport, over 145 square kilometres.
The Pulse includes 236 town houses, which will be completed by December 2018. They will be followed by 152 apartments in a project called The Pulse Boulevard Apartments and 60 apartments in a block to be known as The Pulse Residence, all of which are expected to be completed by June 2019.
At The Villages, Dubai South said that it planned to build 254 town houses by December 2018 and two blocks of apartments – 209 The Villages Apartments and 217 The Villages Residences – by June 2019.
Prices would start from Dh300,000 to Dh350,000 for a studio.
To create a happy community, Dubai South decided to separate blocks of homes from those including larger units, said Ahmed Al Ansari, acting chief executive of Dubai South.
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Photo gallery
■ New property projects at Cityscape Global 2016 in Dubai – in pictures
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“The millennials do not want to have children running up and down the corridors early in the morning and the families do not want to be kept awake by people having parties,” he said. “So we took the decision to separate all of our studios and one-bedroom apartments in these first blocks from the larger two-bedroom and three-bedroom apartments.”
Dubai South will be judged on the happiness levels of its residents, he said.
Dubai South is the first property developer to use the Dubai Government’s new happiness meter, which asks users to rate their level of happiness. The developer says that if enough people define themselves as unhappy when using its website the company will be held accountable by the Government.
“It is not our call to decide what happens if people are unhappy. The data will go immediately to the Government and the Government will make us accountable to make people happier,” said Mr Al Ansari.
Despite these bold claims, Mr Al Ansari’s scope to improve residents’ happiness does not give him carte blanche to slash rents or house prices for the first 1,291 homes the company showcased at Cityscape Global.
Dubai South, formerly known as Dubai World Central, was launched in 2006 as the world’s first purpose-built “aerotropolis”, with Al Maktoum International Airport at its core.
lbarnard@thenational.ae
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