Work begins in the commercial center of Benidorm with an investment of 210 million euros

The multinational Unibail Rodamco has projected a space of 58,000 square meters that will be finished in 2020

The mayor emphasizes that the center will create 2,700 jobs and will be "the most sustainable in Spain"

The French multinational Unibail-Rodamco has already begun the construction of a shopping center in the industrial estate of Benidorm, which will have about 58,000 square meters, which will be completed by the beginning of 2020.

This noon the mayor, Toni Perez; the Director of Development and Investment of Unibail-Rodamco in Spain, Javier Solís; the General Director of Commerce and Consumer Affairs of the Generalitat, Natxo Costa; and the Urbanism councilor, Lourdes Caselles, have recreated the plantation of an olive tree to symbolize the start of this project in which the Gala firm will invest 210 million euros. This event was also attended by the presidents of the employers Hosbec and AICO, Toni Mayor and Raul Parra; Members of the municipal corporation; And representatives of various business associations.

The shopping center will have over 120 shops, a hypermarket, 3,000 parking spaces and an entire leisure facility with eight movie theaters and more than 20 restaurants. According to company estimates, the opening of these facilities will generate 1,700 direct jobs and another 1,000 indirect jobs - in the work and maintenance of the facilities once operational.

After analyzing these forecasts of impact on the labor market, the mayor has assured that "it is necessary to make feasible these investments that generate employment"; and has highlighted that the commercial center designed by Aranguren and Gallegos "puts in value the powerful architecture and urbanism of Benidorm" and "will be a perfect balcony to the city", being planned as a terraced space that looks at the urban plot and the Mediterranean.

Pérez has stated that it is a project that "respects the environment" and that "converges with the fundamental axis" of the work of the City Council and the corporation that is "innovation and technology put at the service of sustainability." And it is that apart from its dimensions and spaces, Solís has stressed that this shopping center will be "innovative" and "the most sustainable in Spain", as it will have 30% of its area landscaped with native vegetation and will consume 60% Less water - the equivalent of 93 Olympic pools a year - than other commercial spaces of similar characteristics.

Sustainability has also marked the planning of how to get to this center, so there will be bike lanes, parking for bicycles, places reserved for the recharge of electric vehicles and public transport, including one less polluting in which one already works With the Town Hall.

Both the mayor and the person in charge of Unibail-Rodamco have underlined the work done by the municipal technicians and by the councilor of Urbanism. Solís thanked "the consensus" with which the corporation has worked - the current and previous ones - to make possible the construction of this shopping center, which comes "10 years after buying the space."

Parallel to the beginning of these works, the City Council and the Independent Association of Merchants (AICO) are working together to implement measures to improve and promote commercial activity, and create positive synergies between the two models: shopping mall and trade urban. To this end, both parties consider it necessary that the future commercial center of the industrial estate be linked pedestrianly to the urban fabric of the city, for which it is indispensable that the Generalitat reconsider its position, attend and give priority to the cession of CV-70 And to the TRAV delegation to its passage through Benidorm.