Dubailand: Disney World Of The Middle East?

Among its many other contributions to urban futurism, Dubai is soon to be the home of the world's largest theme park, Dubailand, which when completed will be larger than all of Orlando, Florida.

1 minute read

June 28, 2007, 5:00 AM PDT

By Michael Dudley

"Widely touted as the Middle East's very own Orlando, Dubailand, a cluster of mega-billion-dollar projects, is gradually emerging across the desert sands of the booming Gulf emirate. Faced with a dwindling wealth of oil, Dubai has taken on a new challenge of larger-than-life projects in line with its ambition to become the region's main business and leisure hub.

Already primed as a holiday destination, it is fast executing plans to build a host of new hotels, golf courses, malls and leisure facilities in order to more than double the number of tourists to 15 million by 2015.

Initially planned to cover an area of 2 billion square feet (185 square kilometers), Dubailand, billed as the "world's most ambitious tourism, leisure and entertainment project," is expected to be a sprawling 3 billion square feet.

This would make it larger than the entire city of Orlando, Florida - home to Walt Disney World, Universal Resort, Sea World and a variety of other attractions and hotels."

FULL STORY: $64 billion Dubailand projects on fast track to rival top world tourism destinations

Friday, June 22, 2007 in Daily Star

Architecture Middle East

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