Trump Organization, together with real-estate investor MRP International, Brazilian construction company Even Construtora e Incorporadora SA, and investment-services firm Salamanca Group, have unveiled plans to build Trump Towers Rio, a large-scale commercial development in Rio de Janeiro. The development, valued at over $2.5 billion, will be the first Trump-branded project in Brazil and features five 38-storey buildings comprising over 345,000 square feet in the city’s downtown port district of Porto Maravilha.
Construction of the first two of the five planned towers will begin in the second half of 2013 and are expected to be finished ahead of the 2016 Olympic Games, which Rio is hosting. Officials have said that the timetable for construction of the remaining three towers will depend on Brazilian real estate market and global economy.
Rio’s mayor is also planning some $10 billion in improvements to the area, including a new train service, new roads, aerial tramways, improved lighting and natural gas piping. However, despite the promise of development and the creation of new jobs, the project has been criticised for its excessive scale and for displacing hundreds of families from the area that the towers are to occupy.
