I had posted an article about this project last year, but at that time the plan was to build three finger type peninsulas to the east of Punta Pacifica. That was the fourth proposal made and it raised a lot of issues because it showed high rise buildings placed right in front of the Trump Ocean Club, Los Faros, Pacific Village and a number of other existing projects. Now it appears they have received approval for the project to be off the tip of Punta Pacifica and a limit of only three stories for the residences.
This is a very ambitious undertaking. It is not nearly as simple as acquiring land and building on it. Here you first must create the land by using fill and you have to have some barriers constructed first to keep the fill from washing into the sea. There are many challenges to doing a project such as this, but of course it can be done. Just look at Dubai where they have built many islands in the sea for residential communities. The question is, what will it cost and can the cost justify the prices they will have to charge for homes on these islands? The article points out that there will be 138 residences and the initial investment is $140 million. So, without home construction costs and profit they are at over a million dollars each just for starters.

If the Panama boom is real and all of the 40,000 or so apartments under construction or planned will have people living in them, then there may be sufficient demand that would justify creating more land to build more luxury housing. My bet is that the boom is nearing the end of its run and this plan will be shelved before a great deal more money is poured into it which is probably a good thing. The traffic is bad enough in Punta Pacifica and the increased need for infrastructure would only make life more unpleasant for those who chose to live there.

From La Prensa

With only three weeks behind him as manager of ICA Panama, Diego Hernández announced yesterday the construction of two islands off Punta Pacífica with an initial investment of $140 million.

The rights to fill the marine area designated for the project derive from concessions granted ICA Panama by the state for construction and administration of the Corredor Sur.

Hernández explained that this project is different to the one previously proposed for the site, which included three islands in its design. The Ministerio de Vivienda has already given preliminary approval of a real estate development plan for 138 residences up to three stories in height, according to a December 2007 report.

The two islands will covera total of 19.1 hectares, roughly the equivalent of five baseball stadiums. One island will be divided into 72 lots, and the other will have 66, with lots ranging between 800 and 1,800 square meters.

The Autoridad Nacional del Ambiente (Anam) has already approved the development´s environmental impact assessment (EIA), although Anam’s project director Bolívar Zambrano explained that it was done in 1999.

Sewage generated by the future island communities will be treated at the Punta Pacífica plant which has a maximum capacity four times greater than it is currently processing.

ICA Panama said that the islands will be located 150 meters off the coast.

Source: http://primapanama.blogs.com/_panama_residential_devel/2008/05/residential-isl.html#more