Mickey Mouse and friends at Disneyland Paris will be quaking in their boots (or whatever their preferred footwear) – a Paramount Pictures theme park has come one step closer to becoming a reality in Murcia.
get your thrills
Premursa, the company backing the project, have now completed the deal to purchase the land needed for the park at a cost of 15 million Euros with construction starting at the end of this month. So confident are they of this that the Minister of Culture and Tourism for Murcia confirmed last week that there would be a ceremony to mark the laying of the cornerstone at the site on 31 May. The theme park will become the flagship resort for the film studio in Europe as well as a first class business, conference and exhibition centre. The theme park is scheduled to be open in Easter 2015.
The site will be located in Alhama de Murcia – just a 30 minute drive from Murcia’s new Airport, Covera International (now set to open in 2013) and an hour’s drive from San Javier Airport – and be equivalent in size to 2,500 football fields. The park will include different zones inspired by popular movies such as Star Trek, Mission Impossible and Indiana Jones.
Spock hears the news
Even Spock's pleased about it. You just can't tell because being half vulcan, it's not so natural for him to show emotion...
It’s not had the smoothest of journeys so far with delays and fears that the economic crisis would put an end to the project altogether so this is fantastic news for the region. The park will create over 20,000 jobs and its backers expect to attract up to 3 million visitors in the first year.
Already featuring the popular coastal and golf resorts of Condado de Alhama, Mar Menor and Hacienda Riquelme, this part of Spain is only going to get hotter come 2015.
Good news also for Spain’s troubled airports.