Maritime City

At its launch in 2004 Dubai Maritime City was described as a mixed-use development for the maritime industry comprising industrial, commercial, residential and leisure facilities housed on a man-made peninsula between Port Rashid and Dubai Dry Docks.

The masterplan for DMC aims to create a cluster of like-minded companies, with six large and diverse sectors having been identified for the facility: marine services; marine management; product marketing; marine research and education; recreation; ship design and manufacturing.

It will also provide an ideal location for international trade seminars, exhibitions, conferences and symposia related to the maritime industry.

The development incorporates four key areas spread across a 227-hectare man-made peninsula:

• A commercial area with a harbour, offices for maritime-related businesses, banks, support services, restaurants and a flexible exhibition site.
• A leisure area including a museum and a marina with berthing for yachts.
• A repair area comprising a dockyard, ship supply outlets, a ship repair area, a ship building area, and a maritime retail area. Key components of the repair yard will be two brand new ship lifts and state of the art equipment, with the repair and ship building side of the business to be expanded to include yacht and dhow repair, in addition to steel work.
• A marine academy to provide a huge boost within Dubai Maritime City to marine research and education in the region, while an oceanographic research centre and naval history museum will add further educational value.

It was expected that Dubai Maritime City would be able to accommodate a large percentage of the 30,000 to 40,000 boats and yachts predicted to be moored in Dubai.

The Maritime Centre

Located at the tip of the peninsula, this is the focal point of DMC. Designed as an urban corporate park it offers a variety of business amenities such as state-of-the-art international maritime conference facilities, as well as shops and restaurants with walkways and promenades, recreational area and attractive landscaping. The 2004 masterplan includes a cluster of five high-rise towers called the Creek Towers and Plaza; a landmark tower located at the head of the man-made peninsula; and seven plots reserved for potential developers planning to construct their own towers. The centre will also contain a five-star business hotel and premium service apartments.

The Industrial Precinct

This is the ship-repair complex capable of serving more than 80 vessels at a time across 42 berths. Among its facilities are the Gulf region’s largest ship lift for ship repair and maintenance, and a boat licensing facility.Other elements of the Industrial District are 19 ship-repair plots, a 3,115m quay wall, 31 small dry berths, 11 large dry berths, a rail transfer system, a 1,720m wet berthing, shops, showrooms and canteens.

Once completed, the drydock at Jadaf will be relocated to DMC.

A slipway or boat ramp, will be provided in the South East corner while a finger pier, for the removal of smaller boats, will be located at the East end of the site.

There will be sufficient access and storage to the rear of the quay walls for equipment and materials to be used in boat repair and manufacture.

The second basin will be oval, measuring approximately 400m long and 300m at its widest point. The quay walls will be provided at the edge of the marina with a water depth of between five and nine metres, whilst the basins are linked by an access channel approximately 500m long.

All quay walls have been constructed with pre-cast concrete block on a rock foundation, with the exception of the half a kilometre stretch of area surrounding the ship lifts, which have been designed as sheet piled quay walls in order to accommodate the ship lift mechanisms.

The Museum

This will be the UAE’s first specialized maritime museum, located in the Academic Quarter of Dubai Maritime City. Preliminary plans show that the 4,000 square metre museum will provide graphic displays, artefacts, multi-media tools and demonstrations, and contain exhibits such as marine life, history of the region, boating and pearling records, Arab navigation technologies, and other major marine-related industries.

On completion, the museum will form an essential link between the industrial, residential and commercial users of Dubai Maritime City, with the more casual visitors, whether international tourists or local residents. It is only one of the planned educational facilities to be incorporated in the City, as the dedicated Academic Quarter will also feature an academy to provide maritime training and research.

Maritime Education University

Dubai Maritime City has commenced negotiations with the International Association of Maritime Universities (IAMU) to construct an academic centre for maritime science in the Academic Quarter of the DMC. 

On completion, the Maritime Education University will be a fully comprehensive education, training and research institute for maritime science and will play a key role in the creation of a pool of professional manpower for the global maritime industry. An initial proposal reveals that the University will offer an array of full-time and short courses, covering at least ten disciplines such as maritime law; maritime engineering management; IT in maritime; logistics; environment management; ship management and operation; ship building management; ocean energy technology; among others. Spread over 27,000 square metres, the University will also be affiliated with a research and development (R&D) institute to assist doctorate students with their studies.

Landmark Tower

The Landmark Tower provides magnificent views of the Gulf, the coastline and Dubai itself. A mixed-use development, with offices, a 5-star business hotel with serviced apartments, a business centre, and a retail and leisure facility, the 229 meter tower is the tallest tower in Dubai Maritime City.

Images depicting the initial concept designs for Maritime City.

Projects often go through a number of design revisions as they progress and developers may or may not honour their original plans when it comes to architectural designs, amenities and landscaping. The images below are provided as a means to compare the original plans with the realised development.

All developers are required to obtain green building certification to ensure energy conservation and optimised living conditions, making DMC the first maritime centre to implement such strict environmental compliance and long-term sustainability initiatives.

The rapidly increasing number of occupants prompted DMC to initiate the upgrade of the existing effluent treatment systems to offer first-grade services for the businesses in the Industrial Precinct. According to DMC, by November 2021 the project team had achieved 98% of the design work and 36% of the engineering and placement of contracts related to the upgrade project that commenced in October 2020 and is scheduled for completion in Q2 of 2022.

In February 2022 Dubai Maritime City announced the launch of a Dh140 million infrastructure project to develop road, water, telecom and other facilities at the maritime hub. The new DMC infrastructure will integrate DMC with the Mina Rashid area that includes the QE2 Hotel, P&O Marinas and Marina Cubes.

The project also includes developing networks for deep sewage, stormwater, fire, irrigation, potable water, telecommunication, and roads.

The sewage and stormwater networks are each serviced by a lift station. The sewage lift station comprises an underground reinforced concrete wet well of 360m³ capacity with an above ground control room. The wet well is equipped with pumps with a capacity of 300 litres per second. The network consists of 6km of sewerage pipelines, 150 manholes and house connection chambers. The stormwater lift station services an 8km drainage network with 70 manholes and 300 gully chambers.

The fire and irrigation networks are served by a combined pump station, consisting of an underground tank of 460m3 for fire fighting and 1,240m³ for irrigation. They support a fire fighting network of 38 hydrants and 5.5km of pipelines, the irrigation tank supports 39 valve chambers and a pipeline of 6km. The other networks consist of 6km of potable water, 10km telecom and 7km of road.

See the development of Maritime City in photos: