The Hellinikon - Urban Development Project, Athens

The Hellinikon - Urban Development Project, Athens

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The vision of LAMDA for the development of the former Hellinikon airport is the design of a pioneering development for Athens, with emphasis on the creation of a world class Metropolitan Park covering an area of 2,000,000 sq.m., as well as the enhancement of the Coastal Front, both fully accessible to the public.

The Project consists of an integrated urban development model that will combine the area’s natural beauty and unique inherent characteristics with landmark buildings and state-of-the-art infrastructure. The ‘green’ and ‘smart’ design approach of the Project will offer world-class services and amenities while improve the standard of living of the entire Attica area’s inhabitants.

The investment will include a diverse range of residential communities, hotels, shopping centers, family entertainment venues, museums and cultural venues, health and wellness centers, significant space for sports and recreation, a modern business park with an educational and R&D hub as well as the total regeneration of the existing marina and the entire Coastal Front that will, along with the Park, will be the major attractions of the site.

The Project constitutes the largest urban regeneration project in Europe, designed to add significant new investments and uses in the areas of tourism, culture, entrepreneurship, innovation and in the environment. Thus, it is expected to have a positive effect not only on the region of Attica but on the entire country as well.

The investment amounts to € 8 bn., and is expected to create 10,000 permanent jobs during the construction period and 75,000 jobs (IOBE study, July 2016) during its maturity. Moreover, the Project is expected to substantially contribute to the repositioning of Athens as one of the major world class tourist destinations as it will provide a significant number of new units as well as thematic tourism venues, expected to attract at least 1 mil new tourists while significantly reduce seasonality and at the same time increase the average stay over and spending of tourists in Athens. The Hellinikon Project investment is expected to contribute to the country’s GDP by 2.4% until the development’s completion date, while contributing a total of over € 14 bn. in taxes to the Greek State over the same timeframe.

For more information please visit Hellinikon’s website: http://www.thehellinikon.com

Greek tourism in the Thomas Cook trap

The damage from its bankruptcy although it has not yet been calculated is huge and many Greek businesses can be destroyed.

The bankruptcy of a tourism giant such as Thomas Cook has naturally rocked international tourism and this has had dramatic repercussions on Greece.

An unexpected domino of developments has affected hotels, tourist agents, procurers, workers, and travelers.

Thomas Cook over the last years was one of the main supporters of Greek tourism bringing millions of tourists to major destinations such as Crete, Rhodes, Kos, and the Ionian Islands.

The damage from its bankruptcy although it has not yet been calculated is huge and many Greek businesses can be destroyed.

The damages of the company’s bankruptcy have not yet been calculated yet they are enormous and can shut down many businesses.

By all accounts, especially during the years of the crisis, Greece’s productive model must change.

Obviously since tourism is Greece’s main revenue-raising source, unavoidably such a major collapse will wound the economy.
In a period that economic expectations and the investment climate are improving an unpredictable external factor is creating conditions of alarm and concern.

Due to the tourism concentration in our country we are much more vulnerable to international turbulence.

For years there were warnings about the dependence of the Greek tourism product on to two or three major tourism players and that this involved unforeseeable and uncontrollable dangers.

The great dependence of the economy on tourism revenues render it much more vulnerable to pressures and to the collapse of giants such as Thomas Cook.

Obviously tourism will retain a hegemonic role but it is also obvious that other sectors of the economy must be developed.
The exploitation of Greece’s sun, sea, and natural environment have a limit.

Greece has other productive sources and human resources to modernise and adjust the tourist product but also to develop sectors of the economy which today are not competitive.

There are opportunities and possibilities as long as one avoids easy answers and a dependence on oligopolistic giants which with their greed can as in the current case cause grave harm to businesses and the economy.

ΤοΒΗΜΑ Team

25.09.2019, 05:10