MANILA, Philippines -- THE 16-HECTARE GREENHILLS Shopping Center will soon get more than just a facelift as the Ortigas group has mapped out a P20-billion redevelopment plan that will double its retail space for rent.
Joey Santos, chief of Ortigas & Co.’s shopping mall division, said in an interview that the group has finished the renovation of almost all buildings in the prime shopping center except for Shoppesville.
“But the next step really is increasing floor area and adding shopping mall space,” he said. “We now have 100,000 square meters of shopping area. We want to at least double that.”
Doubling the retail area available for lease is also meant to increase the revenue stream of the shopping center, the cash cow of Ortigas & Co., a privately held upscale property developer. The Greenhills property -- a popular retail and recreation center -- pumps in about P1 billion in annual rental revenues each year.
Under the redevelopment plan, which will be rolled out over the next 10 to 15 years, Santos said some of the old buildings would be torn down to give way to new ones. This will include the 40-year-old Unimart grocery building.
“We will start with something this year. One of the first developments would be the new Music Museum, a 1,200-seat performing arts theater beside the Promenade. We’ll build parking underneath that, and that essentially starts the first phase,” Santos said.
He said the company would undertake the redevelopment of the Greenhills property on its own.
“We need in excess of P20 billion but we’ll do it -- like most [large-scale] developments 10-15 years,” Santos said.
Over the next three years, he said the group would likely spend about P1 billion for the initial stage of development.
Santos added that the Greenhills center has not felt the pinch yet from the much-anticipated slowdown in consumer spending linked to the global economic recession this year.
He noted that Greenhills’ supermarkets, the bellwether of consumer spending in the area, had even generated higher sales in the first few months of this year compared to last year.
