Zurich relocates headquarters to MesseCity Cologne
Zurich Group Germany is relocating its Rheinland headquarters to the planned MesseCity Cologne. The insurance group will move into three buildings in the western part of MesseCity, including a tower around 60 meters high. A total of around 2,700 employees will work in the new headquarters on a rental area of around 60,000 square meters.
After the rental agreement was signed on 2 May 2016, the project is now entering the realization phase. The developers are Strabag Real Estate (SRE) and ECE Projektmanagement. It is planned that the project partners SRE and ECE will conclude the land purchase agreement with the City of Cologne in the next few days. The building application will then be prepared and submitted in the coming months.
Construction work with the excavation of the building pit could start in 2016. The first preparatory construction measures on the MesseCity site already began in mid-February. Completion of the first buildings is planned for the end of 2019. The construction of the underground parking garage in the western area, which will provide around 600 of the total of 1,000 parking spaces planned for MesseCity, will also be carried out together with the components intended for the Zurich Group.
Parallel to the preparation of the building permit, SRE and ECE are holding talks with other prospective tenants, including two hotel operators.
New quarter on the right bank of the Rhine under construction
The signing of the contract with Zurich was preceded by a façade competition, in which the designs of the architectural firms KSP Jürgen Engel Architekten, gmp von Gerkan, Marg und Partner, Max Dudler and Ortner & Ortner were selected for realization at the beginning of March. The western part of the major project, which has now been leased by Zurich, will be realized according to the design by KSP.
The planned hotel building in the center of the quarter is to be built according to the design by gmp, the high-rise building planned in the immediate vicinity according to the plans by Max Dudler. The design by Ortner & Ortner is planned for the eastern area of MesseCity.
With MesseCity Köln, SRE and ECE are developing around 135,000 square meters of floor space on a 5.4-hectare site in Cologne-Deutz on the right bank of the Rhine. Six 7- to 16-storey buildings with office space, hotels, restaurants, small-scale retail outlets for the district and possibly a cinema are planned between the South Entrance of Koelnmesse and the Deutz ICE train station. The central trade fair balcony, around which MesseCity Köln is structured, is to become the new focal point of the urban quarter. (ah)
