For drivers of the 100,000 cars making their day-to-day trip between Abu Dhabi and Dubai, a cluster of landmarks identifies the dusty junction at Al Shahama and Al Bahia, 30 kilometers outside Abu Dhabi, where the E11 joins the E10.
Most obvious is the battered arcade of shops and flats that runs for two kilometers along the motorway, buffering the scattered schools and houses of New Shahama from the incessant noise of the Sheikh Zayed Road.
Most useful is a shining Adnoc Oasis, a 24-hour source of fuel, food, and a popular rendezvous for young men and women of the area who gather there before disappearing into the night in their 4x4s and customized saloons.
But most anticipated is Deerfields Townsquare, the latest addition to Abu Dhabi’s burgeoning retail landscape and a mall that local residents hope will finally deliver the kind of shopping, dining and leisure facilities they have lacked.
The shopping centre has been a long time coming, having been launched by a subsidiary of the Al Fahim Group at Cityscape Abu Dhabi in 2008.
The original intention was to take advantage of a location close to Abu Dhabi International Airport to lure tourists to a Dh1 billion development of hotels, residential accommodation and commercial property.
This first incarnation featured a theme designed to evoke the glamour of the Victorian period complete with stained glass, gilded domes and an aviary, but the scheme more than doubled the developer’s budget. Soon after, the global economic downturn kicked in.
The Victorian theme has since been ditched, the total leasable space reduced from 130,000 square meters to just over 80,000, and the focus of the mall changed completely.
Deerfields Townsquare now calls itself a community mall, with mid-market brands and facilities to appeal to locals, including a Carrefour hypermarket, a food court, cinema and a family entertainment center.
In the parts of the long New Shahama arcade that aren’t derelict, other shop owners have also started to renovate and improve.
As with many local residents, Rosanna di Giuseppe, an Italian hairdresser, is looking forward to the social and the entertainment options Deerfields Townsquare promises to provide.
The mall will feature a “family entertainment center” where she plans to take her children.
But Mrs di Giuseppe also admits that her existing shopping habits will be hard to break.
She and her family have lived in Al Bahia for the past four years and she says she has developed shopping habits similar to her Emirati neighbors.
“I love the smaller shops in Shahama,” Mrs di Giuseppe says. “If I need some material, I wave with my hand and somebody comes to my car.
“If they cannot speak English, I draw what I need on a piece of paper and they get it. I love the fact that the people know me there.”
With Ibn Battuta Mall less than 45 minutes away by car, the drive to Dubai is usually preferable to a trip to Abu Dhabi for Mrs di Giuseppe.
But if she cannot manage the journey, a trip to the local stores always seems to suffice.
“You can get all the normal things that you need only a daily basis, and some of the more unusual things as well,” she says.
“I was looking for swimming armbands for my two-year-old. I looked everywhere in the city – Carrefour, Ace Hardware, Marina Mall – but I couldn’t get them anywhere, so I went to Shahama and I found them.”
The opening of Deerfields Townsquare promises to herald something more than Al Shahama’s somewhat belated arrival on Abu Dhabi’s retail map.
Despite the problem that some members of the local community may have with its name, Deerfields Townsquare does at least contain the seed of what members of the local community say they most desperately need – somewhere they can meet, socialise and take their children.
The mall may also provide the people of Al Shahama and Al Bahia with a renewed sense of community and identity, a real town square.
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