CRADLE City will be the first planned city built around an airport in SA.

The green-driven city will be situated on 912ha of land around Lanseria International Airport, north of Johannesburg.

The development will be a mix of high- and low-density residential, commercial, office and warehousing space, with a hotel, resort and entertainment component. It is being undertaken by Amari Land, and is partly financed by Nedbank.

The project will take 25 years to complete.

Markus Kaps, director of development at Amari, says: “In addition to a unique location with Lanseria International Airport as the catalyst for the development, we are in an extraordinary position to build a city from inception. This is an exciting opportunity to optimise the mix of uses, facilities and amenities.”

The airport will be the economic driver for the city’s growth. Strong residential growth in the surrounding areas, improvements to existing roads and the convenience of Lanseria are creating increasing demand for the airport’s services. Kulula.com is the only national passenger airline flying from Lanseria, but others are expected to use Lanseria for some of their flights.

The number of departing passengers is expected to increase from 300 000 a year now to almost 7-million in 2017.Scheduled flights are seen growing from 1 100 a year to about 4 000 flights in 10 year's time.

Cradle City is aligned with the Gauteng growth and development strategy and has local and provincial government support. Its landholding has received a mayoral committee recommendation for development master plan approval for a potential 7,7-million square metres. Of this, 3,2-million square metres will be residential, 2,2-million square metres offices, 1,14-million square metres industrial, 700 000m² retail, and 208 000m² will be for tourism and leisure. Nearly 260ha will be reserved for environmental elements.

The first of the six phases will be Cradle City Business Park, followed by a 178ha mixed use area including medium- and high-density housing, commercial, retail and public facilities.

Sherry Seward, MD of Cradle City sales, says: “Cradle City will become a complete destination, with everything required for quality everyday living … in a vibrant, sustainable environment.”

Ryno Nel, new business manager at Nedbank Corporate Property Finance, says Nedbank is pleased to be involved and is providing R240m in financing.

The plan is to create a city that will use 40% of the electricity of an existing city of the same composition and size, and half the potable water, while creating only 60% of the solid waste and 35% of carbon dioxide emissions from vehicles.

Source: Business Day