Dubai, a city
already known for its massive collection of parks, attractions and amenities,
is getting its first Natural Adventure Park, according to officials.
The park is
planned for the Mushrif Park area, west of uptown Mirdif and somewhat inland
from the Dubai coastal area.
Officials
estimate the park will get 23,000 visitors in its first year, and 35,000 by the
second year. At the end of the park’s fourth year, officials expect 69,000
visitors annually.
Features will
include ropes courses and climbing on horizontal and vertical walls.
Planners expect
the project to draw school groups and give younger visitors some much-needed
time away from devices and the artificial environments of a major city.
“We believe that dealing with nature is a basic human need,
especially for young people who need persuasion to stop the use of electronic
gadgets,” Mohammad Al Awadhi, director of Parks and Horticulture Department in Dubai, said in a press release. “For people who are looking for something to help them escape from
their daily routine, it is the best way to do so.”
The Natural Adventure Park is impressive by any standard, not just
for its financial impact, but because it represents a very modern outlook
toward quality of life. While packing the city full of other attractions, Dubai
planners also recognize principles held by school administrators, health
experts and other technocrats: that people are meant to experience nature.
The advent of the natural park project and so many other new
projects in downtown Dubai continue to enhance the city’s status as a world
leader in urban innovation.
For some insight on what’s
driving the UAE’s enormous investment in “quality of life” infrastructure, Gulf News Journal spoke with Mahfuz Meherzad Friday. Meherzad is an adjunct professor of government and political affairs at Millersville University in
Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.
“They’re preparing to be a
post-oil economy,” Meherzad told Gulf News Journal. “They want to
re-brand the UAE as a tourist destination — a play land.”
Meherzad said the UAE seeks to
diversify away from oil as prices fall, and away from financial services, for
which demand can be volatile.
Also, he said, planners invest in
parks and other amenities to try to dissolve a “simmering tension” that exists,
in part, because the citizenry lacks some of the hallmarks of a modern
democracy, such as electoral power.
“They make sure that the people
are well-fed and well-amused,” Meherzad said.
