Huge leisure complex planned for Espoo

Facilities to include a water park and a 270-metre long indoor ski slope

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The City of Espoo has reserved a prominent site in its Perkkaa district for a massive indoor entertainment complex called Lifestyle Park. The site is close to the new shopping centre Sello and the Leppävaara railway station, next to Ring Road I.
      The future Lifestyle Park is to be designed by Evata Development Ltd, and it would house five main operations including a spa, a hotel, a movie centre, a multipurpose arena, and an indoor ski-centre. In addition, there would be shops, cafés, and restaurants.
     
Currently, Evata Development is seeking out investors and operators for this new entertainment centre. According to Managing Director Heikki Mäkinen, a preliminary agreement with an entrepreneur who is to be in charge of the indoor skiing centre has already been signed. Negotiations with other tenants are under way.
      The total share of the five major tenants of the entire project is around 70 percent. The aim of Evata Development is to complete contracts with them next autumn.
      Once the project has been secured, the City of Espoo will either sell or lease the site to the entertainment complex, and the zoning of the 7-hectare area will be carried out according to the needs of the applicant.
      Perkkaa’s Lifestyle Park is not the first to introduce an idea of an indoor ski-slope in the province of Uusimaa. Potential locations for a ski tunnel have been Vantaa’s districts of Hakunila and Sotunki, Espoo’s Serena water park, and the Keinukallio district of Kerava. None of them were realised.
     
According to Evata Development’s estimates, the entertainment centre could be opened in 2009.
      The plans are indeed ambitious. The spa, for example, is being referred to as an "Xtreme Water Park". One of the pools would have artificial waves large enough to allow for surfing.


Links:
  Evata Development

Helsingin Sanomat