The Dubai Mall is the world’s largest shopping mall based on total area and sixth largest by gross leasable area. Located in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, it is part of the 20-billion-dollar Burj Khalifa complex, and includes 1,200 shops. Access to the mall is provided via Doha Street, rebuilt as a double-decker road in April 2009.
Twice delayed, Dubai Mall opened on 4 November 2008, with about 635 retailers, marking the world’s largest-ever mall opening in retail history. However it is not the largest in gross leasable space, and is surpassed in that category by several malls including the South China Mall, which is the world’s largest, Golden Resources Mall, SM City North Edsa, and SM Mall of Asia.
The Dubai Mall recorded 60,000 tickets sold for the Dubai Aquarium and Discovery Centre in the first five days, following its opening. The Dubai Mall hosted over 37 million visitors in 2009, and attracts more than 750,000 visitors every week, while in 2010 it hosted 47 million, and saw footfall increase by around 27 percent over 2009, despite the economic crisis. In 2011, Dubai Mall became the world’s most-visited shopping and leisure destination, and attracted more than 54 million visitors, the traffic was a 15 per cent increase from 2010 and surpassed 50.2 million visitors to New York City. The numbers also surpass visitor arrivals to all landmark leisure destinations and theme parks in the world including Times Square (39.2 million), Central Park (38 million), and Niagara Falls (22.5 million).
[caption id="attachment_241103" align="aligncenter" width="515"] Wilhelm Busch portrait by Franz von Lenbach, 1875[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]The Wilhelm Busch Museum (German: Wilhelm Busch - Deutsches Museum für Karikatur und Zeichen...
