Orange Island N40 billion project broaches new housing deal in Lagos

AN ambitious real estate project, classified under the new neighborhoods, christened as Orange Island, to cover 150 hectares of land, located within Lekki corridor in Lagos State, is already underway.

Orange Island, which is synonymous to Eko Atlantic City project, is a newly berth planned city on the Lagos lagoon, estimated to N40 billion and to accommodate 25,000 population when it is eventually delivered.

The project to be delivered in two phases has been described as one of the means by which the Lagos State Government intends to transform the landscape of the state into a more organised and structured mega city.

Brokered under a Public Private Partnership (PPP) initiative, between the Lagos State Government and the developer, Orange Island Development Company (OIDC), the project involves the dredging of sand from the bed of the Lagos Lagoon, reclamation of a 150-hectare island, construction of an access land bridge and infrastructure to service the island. The Project will eventually be a fully serviced; community located 450 meters off the headland next to the existing Lekki Phase 1 foreshore reclamation project.

According to the project layout, the total land mass has been apportioned into different land use purposes including mixed use, 8.4209 hectares; utilities, 2.4239 hectares; educational and public facilities, 5.3146 hectares; business and commercial, 8.0676 hectares; medium density residential, 17.7143 hectares; low density residential, 58.9520 hectares; green and public open space, 15.6563 hectares; and road reserve, 33.4504 hectares.

The layout of the Island will comprise four main schemes made up of residential, commercial, services and recreation/sports zones. The services provided will include electricity, water and sewage system. The Island will be accessed via a dual carriage way located at the end of Admiralty Way in Lekki Phase 1.

Orange Island will be one of the new satellite towns that will be developed in the Lekki, Badagry and Ikorodu districts of Lagos State over the next few years. To this end a Memorandum of Understanding between Lagos State Government and FW Dredging (Sponsors of the project) was signed in January 2013. A Public Private Partnership (PPP) concession agreement will be signed in due course. A special purpose company, Orange Island Development Company was formed for the purpose of owning, developing and operating the project. A joint venture agreement with the Lagos State Ministry of Waterfront Infrastructure Development was signed on 9th January 2014.

In an exclusive chat with The Guardian last week, Commissioner for Water Front Infrastructure Development, Prince Adesegun Oniru, said the project upon completion, will not only add to the existing stock of land mass but adds to the ground rent and other taxes accruable to the state, which will boost the state IGR.

Oniru, while giving insight into the project development, said FW Dredging Nigeria Limited, has concluded its investigations that include engineering/infrastructure designs as well as the land use/town planning design, stating that the EIA has been concluded and reclamation works are on-going.

“As at mid March, over 35 hectares of land has been reclaimed with access road. The Ministry has continued its monitoring work and the management of the Land Concession Agreement including periodic site inspection and stakeholders meetings”, said Oniru, noting that the land-use plan is based on the proposed urban design development concept.

The largest land-use is for low-density residential, with additional higher-density residential options along with main routes.

A mixed land-use component was introduced as suggested in the Lekki Master Plan in order to accommodate variety, urbanely and vitality in the
‘‘village-care” area, saying that the focal and anchor point of the development is a proposed retail and marina to be located on the northern end of the central spine (boulevard).

Managing Director, OIDC, Yinka Ogunsulire, said her firm would reclaim the land and build the infrastructure and reputable developers in partnership with the developer would develop that top structures.

Once built, Ogunsulire added that, subsidiaries of OIDC would manage the utilities, infrastructure and become the municipal managers.

A Nigeria’s foremost indigenous dredging company, FW Dredging Company is the sponsors behind Orange Island project.

Ogunsulire assured investors that; their investments’ are safe, as title on the land would be a deed of sub-lease or assignment from the global certificate of occupancy. She added that, other legal documents would include individual plot survey plan, land form 1C and home-owners agreement.

Partners on the project are KEDARI CAPITAL, Lead Financial Advisors; Mepas & Prodel Nigeria Limited, Town Planning Consultants; FR Projects Services Limited, Project Manager; Keystone Bank, Bankers to the Project; AiQ Capital Management Limited, Financial Advisors; Ecopro Resources, Environment Consultants; Van Oord, Dredging Contractor; and OOLENG Nigeria Limited, Structure and Civil Engineers.

Others are Swampsea Limited, Technical Engineering Consultants; Jackson, Etti & Edu, Solicitors; DELANO ARCHITECTS, Urban Planner & Architects; KOA, Mechanical and Technical Engineers; GREEFF, International Master Planners; VIA CONSULT Pty (Ltd) (SA), Engineering Design Services and ALDER creative intelligence as Brand Consultants.