Bahrain's Ministry of Works, Municipalities Affairs and Urban Planning will be carrying out the infrastructure works for the $1-billion King Abdullah Medical City, a massive healthcare project coming up in the south of the kingdom.

A financing contract worth BD16.5 million ($43.4 million) has been signed between Bahrain government and the Saudi Development Fund in this regard, stated Ahmed Al Khayyat, the works affairs undersecretary at the ministry.

The scope of work includes the main 66 kV power station, a sewage treatment plant, water collection tanks besides sewerage, irrigation and stormwater drainage networks. The ministry will also handle the internal and external roads networks, lighting, telecommunication network and aesthetic works, he added.

The giant medical city project is being funded through a SR1 billion ($267 million) grant from the late Saudi King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz Al Saud and will be built on a one-million-sq-m plot donated by His Majesty King Hamad at Durrat Al Bahrain.

The medical city will be a multiple-phased mixed-use development comprising academic and medical facilities, a research centre, on-site accommodation and other communal facilities to create a self-sustained campus, said senior ministry officials.

Al Khayyat was speaking after a meeting with the officials of Saud Consult, the project consultants for King Abdulla Medical City, in the presence of advisor Nabeel Al Khalfan and Hassan Al Arrayedh from the Electricity & Water Authority and representatives from the Arab Gulf University Hisham Jaffar (HAJ), the project owner.

Highlighting the infrastructure and facilities design stages, Al Khyatt said the preliminary designs for the project have completed, while the detailed designs are presently in process.-TradeArabia News Service