Sky high in Dubai

Dubai looks to the heavens

Residential and commercial property in the doldrums? Not in the United Arab Emirates apparently. While in the UK Brown bails out the City and all around is economic gloom the pocket-sized Gulf state of Dubai marches on – and upwards.

Dubai is the showiest of the seven member states comprising the Emirates. A shoppers paradise with malls to die for if you’re that way inclined. A desert country with temperatures regularly well above 100F where everything is big, flash and commercial, from the Atlantis Hotel where you can pay $25000 for a night to the Nakheel port and harbour complex where you can party on your super yacht.

In the middle of the harbour complex – where there will be homes and offices for 100,000 people – there’ll be almost 20,000 residential apartments – is to be built a tower which will be over a kilometre high – a 1000 metre sky-scraper. To put that in perspective, imagine how it dwarfs Canary Wharf, a pigmy at a mere 235 metres.

The Nakheel tower will be so tall it will have five different micro-climates. The temperature at the top of the building could be 10 degrees cooler than at the bottom. It will have 150 lifts and 200 floors. There’ll be a 100-room hotel at the top of the tower. 30,000 people will be involved in its construction. There’ll be 10,000 parking spaces.

But for all the hype – a massive public relations launch – there remain big question marks. Many economists around the world believe Dubai has its head in the clouds.

Oil prices are falling. World stock markets are being shaken to the core. Lines of credit are being tightened almost hourly. The threat of terrorism remains and is global.

It’s impossible to estimate how much all these factors which have shaken the American, Asian and European economies will impact on the Middle East. But it would be ingenuous to imagine that any corner of the world is immune to such tumultuous events.