BAYWEST MALL By the end of 2014, Baywest Mall’s 65 000 m² roof, as well as a bridge over the N2 highway, had been completed
The construction of the R1.7-billion Baywest Mall, in Port Elizabeth, has resulted in the employment of about 4 300 workers on site since construction started in mid-2013, which is a 43.3% increase on the 3 000 direct jobs that developers had initially forecast for the construction phase of the project, according to independent auditing firm BTKM.
“The Baywest development is a massive economic driver for the region. Not only is the construction phase of the mall creating much-needed jobs but, once the mall opens in April, an additional 1 500 permanent jobs will be created for the mall’s operational phase,” says Baywest MD Gavin Blows.
He adds that the project’s community liaison office has been inundated with job applications from community members seeking to be considered for employment opportunities once the mall opens.
“We are using the applications to compile a database, which we will pass on to our tenants when they look for employees for their stores. Employment opportunities will not end once the mall opens, as we constructed the mall to kick-start various other buildings that we will be constructing in the area,” he explains.
Blows states that Baywest has several other developments in the pipeline. “Baywest City will be to the Eastern Cape what Century City is to the Western Cape,” he avers.
2014 Achievements
By the end of 2014, Baywest’s construction milestones included the completion of the Baywest Mall’s 65 000 m² roof, as well as the completion of a bridge over the N2 highway, which is part of the R300-million Baywest roads development project.
Blows explains that road construction company Basil Read is on course to complete the first phase of the road development project by March. This includes linking Port Elizabeth’s western suburbs to the N2 highway by extending Walker drive, in Sherwood, with a multilane road that will encircle the mall.
“The entire roads project will be complete by September, when Cape road, in Bridgemeade and Rowallan Park, is linked with the N2 via a series of on-ramps and off-ramps that will lead to Baywest Mall. The roads development is set to unlock crucial economic growth in the western suburbs,” he says.
A Bright 2015
Blows says the fittings of many of the 250-plus Baywest Mall stores were already under way by the end of 2014, and that everything was on track to hand over the stores to the major tenants in January.
“This means stores like Edgars, Game, Pick n Pay and Woolworths, which will be stationed at the four quadrants of the mall – could have begun fitting out their stores at the end of last month,” he says.
Further, landscaping is under way at Baywest Mall, such as the planting of coral trees in front of the mall, with completion expected in March. In keeping with the mall’s focus on the environment, indigenous gardens will be created around the mall, Blows concludes.