Azuréa will extend over 25,000 m²: 18,000 m² of office real estate, 7,000 m² for a hotel complex offering a two-star hotel and a three-star hotel (Suit’Hôtel Accor), a parking lot with 350 spaces, a pool in the center for the two hotels, and an Asian-themed garden. By the end of 2008, all the work will be completed. The development of the Arénas site, initiated by Jacques Médecin, took several decades to offer a business district not far from Nice Côte d’Azur International Airport. It is for this reason that Jacques Peyrat and Marie France Dejean both expressed satisfaction, even though it took time. The Senator Mayor amused himself with a comparison to justify the wait: “Rome wasn’t built in a day.” With trowel in hand, turned into a mason—protocol and photographers in attendance—he meticulously set the first stone while teasing Antoine Véran, the mayor of Levens, to lighten the atmosphere and make the official ceremony a bit less dull.
Not far away, the real masons started working, breaking ground. Cranes tower over the tent where speeches are given and where guests can drink and nibble next to the buffet. Naysayers will say they’ll never benefit from this complex, that it’s only made for big companies. It’s not untrue. But it is necessary. Jacques Peyrat explains the objective: “We must advance the eighth urban community of France to become the driver of the region’s economic development.” Noble words, certainly, but they need to be put in perspective with the concerns about students’ job integration, a major current issue, as the Senator Mayor reminds: “The city of Nice made an effort to make the university more attractive. It would be useless if there were no jobs and no housing that companies could offer.” In a few words, he outlines the interest in these complexes, which appear luxurious.
It’s about attracting companies, offering them an ideal place to develop. And development means job creation. In a few months, in this same logic, the construction of the Nice Méridia complex, declared a national strategic issue and under governmental control, will begin. An initial phase of 45,000 m² will be delivered as early as 2009. On a total area of 22 hectares in the Var plain, a business district combining companies and housing will be built.
Azuréa or Méridia are criticized here and there. The Senator Mayor is equally criticized, rightly or wrongly. To keep smiling and see the positive side, one should look at the Azuréa complex and say it’s eight floors of job creation.
