Media release

First component of Claudelands development complete

Posted On: Friday, 2 July 2010

The first component of the Claudelands development is now complete and will be handed over to Hamilton City Council next week. The enhanced exhibition facilities, consisting of two 2,000sqm exhibition halls, will be handed over to Council by contractor Mainzeal.

Claudelands has continued to host events throughout the construction, with shows like the Waikato Home & Garden Show, Motorhome and Caravan Show, and others having successfully worked around the build programme.

Claudelands commercial and development director Mark Christie said it was important to keep existing shows coming to the venue to maintain their presence and appreciated the difficulty that the organisers have had over this period.

The two new exhibition halls were completed to a standard which enabled events to resume there in March, and since then additional work has been carried out to ensure the component is 100% complete.

With an integrated indoor exhibition trade space of up to 6,000m2, complemented by an expansive outdoor hard surfaced exhibition space of up to 3,000m2, the halls will provide an enhanced offering to the centre’s existing exhibition business while also enabling the venue to cater to a new range of events.

Mr Christie said it is exciting to see the first component now complete.

“The exhibition business is extremely important, not only to Claudelands but to the entire city, so it’s great that we are now able to provide exhibition organisers with an enhanced offering,” he said.

As well as the new exhibition halls, the $68.4million development at Claudelands will see the establishment of new 1200-delegate conference facilities and a 5000 capacity indoor arena. Work on both components is currently underway, with the conference facilities due for completion in March 2011 and the arena scheduled to be complete mid-2011.

“While the entire development won’t be finished until next year, the fact that the exhibition component is now complete is exciting as it allows our exhibition business to carry on as we work through the remaining development,” said Mr Christie.

More information about the development is available at www.claudelands.co.nz