• Around 180 specialist shops, cafés, restaurants and service companies, sales area of 38,000 sqm
• CA Immo und ECE about to invest some € 360 m in the grand project
• Grand opening will take place in fall 2013
• gold pre-certificate by the German Sustainable Building Council (DGNB).

With the symbolic ground-breaking ceremony, Construction work for the Skyline Plaza shopping and leisure center in Frankfurt’s Europaviertel began today on 1st June 2011. The grand project will be realized as a joint venture between the shopping center specialist ECE and CA Immo and encompasses an investment volume of approximately € 360 million. Spanning a sales area of 38,000 sqm, the shopping center provides space for around 180 specialist shops, cafés, restaurants and service companies. Skyline Plaza is due to open in fall 2013, the management and letting of the shopping center will remain in the hands of ECE in the long term.

Bernhard H. Hansen, CTO of CA Immo: “I am particularly happy that we will be able to build the Skyline Plaza as a green building. In doing so, we are not only considerably increasing the desirability of the location, but also contributing significantly to the ecological balance sheet.”

Gerhard Dunstheimer, Deputy President of the ECE Management: “Frankfurt can look forward to a new, highly appealing meeting place for shopping, leisure and gastronomy. As a unique shopping experience, the Skyline Plaza will attract visitors from far outside the city’s limits and thus sustainably fortify Frankfurt’s position as a top shopping metropolis.”

Awarded for sustainable planning and urban integration
The shopping center is part of the new Europaviertel in the west of Frankfurt. By 2019, the site of the old railway freight depot will be transformed into a new district full of offices, hotels and flats with a multitude of shopping and leisure possibilities. With its central location in the southeast of the district, the Skyline Plaza is a link between the Messe Frankfurt, the financial district and the city. The shopping center has excellent public transport connections and can also be easily reached by car. There are 2,400 parking spaces provided for the visitors and bicycle stands for approximately 170 bicycles. Within the scope of the extension works on the U5 underground line, the Skyline Plaza will have its own direct connection to the Frankfurt underground network. The architectural highlight is the design of the external façade composed of aluminum panels by the Frankfurt architects Jourdan & Müller. Skyline Plaza is characterized by an incomparable view of the Frankfurt skyline: a 10,000 m2 large roof garden with a wide range of gastronomy and changing events is an attraction worth a visit at any time of the year. Based on its sustainable planning and urban integration, the Skyline Plaza was awarded the gold pre-certificate by the German Sustainable Building Council (DGNB). 

Letting is going according to plan
The letting of the shopping and leisure center is going according to plan. It has already been possible to win Hamburg-based MeridianSpa as a tenant for the 9,000 m2 fitness and wellness area in the Skyline Plaza. In terms of its size, the new facility in the Skyline Plaza will be the largest fitness and wellness center in Frankfurt. The spacious areas on the 3rd and 4th floors and on the roof as part of the roof garden will be home to a first-class facility with a wide range of fitness and wellness.

The scope of the Skyline Plaza project will encompass the construction of the shopping center and a congress center. The congress center should offer a conference capacity for up to 2,400 people. At the end of 2010, the application for building permits was submitted to the Frankfurt building inspection board with Vivico. Negotiations are currently underway with Messe Frankfurt for the management and purchase of the congress center. The synchronized completion will be guaranteed by a shorter construction time for the congress center.

About ECE
ECE has been developing, planning, realizing, letting and managing shopping centers in city centers since 1965. Managing 132 shopping centers and active in 15 countries, it is the European market leader in its field. In all the ECE centers together, approx. 14,000 businesses spanning a shopping surface of 4.2 million m2 in total achieve a total annual turnover of € 15.3 billion. These centers include the Potsdamer Platz Arkaden in Berlin, the Promenaden in Leipzig’s main train station, the Alstertal shopping center in Hamburg and the Ettlinger Tor in Karlsruhe. There are a further 20 shopping centers under construction and in the planning stages across Europe including the Thier-Galerie in Dortmund, the Forum Mitterhein in Koblenz, the Galeria Kaskada in Szczecin (Poland) and the Árkád in Szeged (Hungary). In its other business areas, Office, Traffic and Industries, ECE also realizes other types of buildings, such as the Philips Deutschland headquarters in Hamburg, the ThyssenKrupp quarter in Essen and the Steigenberger Hotel at the new BBI airport in Berlin.

About CA Immo
CA Immo was founded in 1987. The company invests in commercial real estate (and in particular offices) in Austria, Germany and Eastern Europe. Taking account of properties worth some € 1.5 bn acquired through the takeover of Europolis, CA Immo's property assets at the start of 2011 stand at just over € 5 bn; the CEE/SEE and Germany each account for around 40 % of this total.  CA Immo has been listed on the Vienna Stock Exchange since 1988, with free float of around 83% at the present time.

Please address any questions to:

CA Immobilien Anlagen AG
Susanne Steinböck
Tel.: +43 1532 590 7533
Email: steinboeck@caimmoag.com
www.caimmoag.com

Link:
<link fileadmin bilder skylineplaza_low.jpg _blank download>Skyline Place (.jpg)