CPN’s Korat mall to open in November
Central Pattana Plc (CPN), the retail property development arm of Central Group, is scheduled to open CentralPlaza Nakhonratchasima on Nov 3, the company’s 31st shopping mall.
The retail mall is part of a 10.6-billionbaht mixed-use project built on 65 rai, comprising a hotel, convention centre, condominium, shopping mall, lifestyle outdoor market as well as a public park.
The convention centre is scheduled to open on the same day while the hotel and condominium projects are expected to be completed in the next few years.
Pakorn Parthanapat, chief operating officer at CPN, said the mall fits the lifestyle of people in Nakhon Ratchasima and nearby provinces. It will offer floor area of over 355,000 square metres with magnets including Central Department Store, Tops Superstore, Power Buy, SuperSports, B2S, and SFX Cinema.
Some 500 shops offering leading brands of apparel and restaurants have indicated their interest in opening at the mall. Several popular Korean restaurants such as Bonchon chicken and RedSun Thailand Tokpokki together with Matsumoto Kiyoshi, a famous cosmetics and drugstore chain from Japan, are set to debut on the northeastern soil, he said.
Mr Pakorn said 3,000 sq m of the mall will be an outdoor water park, while another 12,000 sq m will be the site of a convention hall and space for events.
The project targets more than 2.63 million residents in a 90km radius, and more than 4 million of people living in provinces nearby, including Chaiyaphum, Surin and Buri Ram. CPN hopes the mall will also be a destination for many of the 7 million tourists a year who visit the area.
A company study found that Nakhon Ratchasima plays a prominent role in helping to drive the country’s economy, trade and investment. It is a gateway to 20 provinces in the Northeast region, which will benefit from future megaprojects such as the high-speed train project (Bangkok-Nakhon Ratchasima), a double-track railways (Map Ka Bao, Saraburi-Jira, Nakhon Ratchasima) and motorway (Bang Pa-in, Ayutthaya-Pak
Chong, Nakhon Ratchasima). All projects are scheduled to be completed by 2020.
The province also connects the region with provinces in the state-backed Eastern Economic Corridor.
Nakhon Ratchasima’s economy ranks among the top 20 provinces in the region, with 245 billion baht of gross regional and province product or GPP as measured by the National Economic Social and Development Board, with growth rate averaging 7.2% a year during 2004-14.