The second giant Chinese indoor snow centre from the Wanda Group has been given an opening date of June 15, 2019.
Guangzhou Wanda Cultural Tourism City, first announced in 2016, is a 50 billion yuan (about $7 billion US) investment project located in the city’s Huadu District. It covers 154 hectares and has a gross floor area of 3.8 million square metres. It will include a Wanda Mall, outdoor theme park, stage show, movie city, water park, numerous hotels, a bar street and more.
The indoor ski area will include four ski runs at different gradients, the longest of which will be 460 meters, with a maximum vertical drop of 66 meters – placing it in the world’s top 5 by slope length and ski area. The park will be able to accommodate up to 3,000 skiers at a time.
The world’s biggest indoor snow centre with an 80,000 square metre snow are located in Harbin in the Northeast of the country was opened by the Wanda Group last year.
Guangzhou (formerly known as Canton) is located in southern China on the Pearl River about 120 km (75 mi) north-northwest of Hong Kong and is one of China’s three largest cities with a population of nearly 15 million.
“As a key development for Southern China, we estimate about 20 million visitors for the first-year operation in Guangzhou,” Andrew Kam, senior vice-president of Wanda Travel Culture Innovation Group and president of Beijing Wanda Themed Entertainment told media. He expects they will break even in their second year. “Rather than competing with existing operators head to head, we are going to make the pie bigger. We will do this by focusing on (new types of) products i.e. world’s second largest indoor ski park and indoor water park,” he added.
China already has the most indoor snow centres open in the world with one report claiming 18 are currently operating – more than twice as many as any other country. Founded in 1988 Wanda Group is based in Beijing and is reported to be the world’s largest private property developer.
