La Defense to attend Cityscape Dubai

La Défense is a major business district located in the West of Paris and is Europe's largest business district, 3.5 million square metres (3.5km2). EPAD was established in 1958 as a public body for the development of La Defense and has been on-going ever since.

In 2006, EPAD launched its '9-year development plan' to give a new dimension to the district and will focus on 4 main areas: regeneration of outdated sky-scrappers; construction of new buildings; improving balance between offices and residential housing; and improving local transport.

Patrick Devedjian, President of EPAD, said:

"We are glad to be the first European business district to showcase at Cityscape Dubai. Global events like this are part of our international policy and will offer us the opportunity to participate alongside other authorities and developers in discussing urban strategies. We look forward to meeting with other companies, investors, sovereign wealth funds; in addition to sharing our expertise and management of business districts. We are here to establish the leadership of La Défense amongst the international business districts."

At Cityscape Dubai, EPAD will have a 90 square metre stand and will present the current and forthcoming real estate projects generated by the development plan, that includes the building of 550,000 square metres of new real estate, all designed according to current international standards and sustainability.

The two principle themes is to integrate La Défense with neighbouring municipalities, devoting a substantial part to open public spaces and residential programs, structuring development around 1500m esplanade; and to exploit on a large scale principle of separating traffic flows, so as to devote outdoor surfaces entirely to foot traffic.

Patrick Devedjian added, "Furthermore, L'EPAD is here to showcase La Défense as part of the State's long-term mission to promote France. We work very closely with the Agence Francaise pour les Investissements Internationaux (French Agency for International Investments) and will be reinforcing the messages to the economic decision-makers of the benefits of investing in Paris: mature market, yield stability, legal framework that ensures transparency of transactions and modern architecture are just some of the benefits."

L'EPAD will be hosting an investor and media presentation on the Thursday 8th October, at 11.30am at stand number 2H10 with Patrick Devedjian.