By Jenniffer B. Austria | Sep. 28,
2014 at 11:01pm [ manilastandardtoday.com ]
Property developer
Ayala Land Inc. has closed the deal to acquire the unfinished Jaka Tower, a
long-time eyesore in the Makati central business district and owned by the
family of Senator Juan Ponce Enrile.
Ayala Land president Bernard Vincent
Dy told the Manila Standard the company completed the acquisition after
conducting a due diligence on the said property.
Dy did not disclose the terms of the
deal, including the acquisition cost because of a non-disclosure agreement.
Dy said Ayala Land would not tear down
the existing Jaka Tower and would just continue erecting the structure, as the
tower was still structurally sound despite being abandoned for more than 15
years now.
“Based on our due diligence we don’t
need to demolish the existing building,” Dy said.
Jaka Tower was originally designed to
be a 49-story office skyscraper by architectural firm Hellmuth, Obata and
Kassabaum. It was supposed to be the
first high-rise project of Enrile’s and then fledging Jaka Property Group.
Construction started in 1996 and was
scheduled for completion by 1999. However, the project was halted when
construction reached the 21st floor amid the 1997 Asian financial crisis, which
affected many other property developers.
Dy said the newly-acquired property
would be a part of the P65-billion redevelopment plan of Ayala Land within the
Makati CBD.
Ayala Land said it was redeveloping
three huge blocks of property at the corner of Ayala Avenue and Buendia Avenue,
to be called City Gate.
The first development of City Gate
will be Ayala Land’s pioneering stacked mixed-use tower located at the Amorsolo
Parking lot.
It will vertically combine retail on
the first three levels with two office buildings above, and finally a Seda
Suites Hotel on top of one of the office buildings.
The project will have a total of
120,000 square meters of gross floor area consisting of 53,000 square meters
intended for business process outsourcing firms; 28,000 square meters intended
for traditional headquarter-type offices; 25,000 square meters, or 312 keys,
for the Seda Suites Hotel ;and 14,000 square meters for the mall.
Once completed, City Gate will cover a
land area of three blocks with a total of 2.2 hectares.
Other components of P65-billion
Makati’s redevelopment plans are phase 2 of the Ayala Center makeover, which
includes the area of Intercontinental Hotel and the parking lot at the back of
the hotel.
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