Credit: Howald City
A group of Luxembourg, Belgium and United States-based real estate and development companies have confirmed that the new Luxembourg City district "Howald City" is taking shape.
The Howald district in Hesperange, just south of Luxembourg City, is undergoing a profound change. The former craft and commercial area is being transformed into a new urban district called Howald City. This is the result of an unprecedented partnership involving six owners and developers: IKO Real Estate, Baltisse, BPI Real Estate, LALUX, Lone Star Funds and Lafayette.
For several months, private and public actors have been working on the transformation of the southern gateway to Luxembourg City. This district of Howald, which was until now mainly dedicated to commercial and artisanal activities, will quickly become a mixed district in line with the continuity of the urban development of the Cloche d'Or district.
The business zone was established on the edge of Luxembourg City in the 1980s. With the redesign of the general development plan, this part of Howald was reclassified as a mixed urban zone, integrating housing, offices, shops and services in a preserved setting of 37 hectares. This includes a buildable area of 750,000 m2 on this territory for the years to come. Land hitherto occupied by storage or tertiary activities will be requalified to accommodate new functions and activities.
From the building point of view, several projects are under development. One of the large-scale projects will be the development of the AXS mixed project led by Baltisse, which recently obtained five building permits to build on a total of 42,500 m2, including at least 15,000m2 dedicated to housing and co-living spaces, 25,000m² to offices and co-working spaces. Lafayette had the new Luxemburger Wort headquarters built there on 6,500m2.
IKO Real Estate is developing several projects: its new headquarters, Well 22 (4,900 m2), the future Maison de la Croix-Rouge which will be located at the current 15-25 Rue des Scillas and more than 15,000 m2 of offices and housing on Rue des Bruyères. Meanwhile, BPI Real Estate has a warehouse (approximately 3,500m2) whose land could be redeveloped in the years to come. As for Lone Star Funds and LALUX, they respectively own the H2O and Cubus C2 and C3 buildings.
This transformation will also affect transport and mobility infrastructure. Howald City will have access to new road infrastructures, such as a new motorway access road, more direct connections to Cloche d'Or and Luxembourg City, the arrival of the new N3 which will connect Luxembourg's Central Railway Station to Howald via Rue des Scillas and the P+R Sud equipped with several Chargy electric / plug-in hybrid vehicle charging terminals.
Moreover, the new multimodal hub is expected to promote shared and soft mobility with access by rail, tram (from 2023), a large number of bus lines, Vel'Oh bicycle rental terminals and mBox locations for bicycles.
With its many actors and stakeholders, the transformation of Howald City is already underway and will be finalised by 2026.
