Saadiyat Island (for “Island of Happiness”) is a natural island and a tourism-cultural environmentally friendly project for Emirati heritage and culture that is located in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. The project is located in a large, low-lying island, 500 metres (1,600 ft) off the coast of Abu Dhabi island. A mixed commercial, residential, and leisure project is currently under construction on the island. When completed, Saadiyat Island is expected to become Abu Dhabi’s cultural centre, mostly for the Island’s Cultural District that is expected to include eight museums. Due to the Corona pandemic, some projects have fallen noticeably behind schedule, but are now on the way to completion.
The island is five-minute drive away from downtown Abu Dhabi, 20 minutes from Abu Dhabi International Airport, and one hour from Dubai. Saadiyat Island, a natural island that is the focus of 27 km2 of development, will be divided into 7 districts which will eventually accommodate over 145,000 people.
Located at the Western end of the island, Saadiyat Cultural District occupies not much more than 10 per cent of the total area of the project. The Cultural District lies on a total area of 2.43 square kilometres (0.94 sq mi). There are plans to spend 85 million pounds on the following projects:
The Marina, the Island’s main commercial area, has a total area of 3.7 square kilometres (1.4 sq mi), berthing for over 1,000 boats, hotels, apartments, leisure and entertainment facilities including the Maritime Museum by Japan’s Tadao Ando, commercial and retail space, and the New York University Abu Dhabi which was planned to move to Saadiyat Marina in 2014 from its provisional campus in downtown Abu Dhabi.
