After years of planning, the Banco de Desarrollo y Exportaciones (Bandex) has secured the green light from the National District City Council to develop a real estate complex on the land surrounding the iconic Quisqueya Stadium in Santo Domingo.
Diario Libre reports that the project has been backed by three consecutive governments since 2009 and encompasses the entire block around the stadium and includes plans for an apartment tower, a hotel, and a museum. Bandex already holds the property titles to the land, transferred by presidential decrees in 2009 and 2014.
The Council’s decision, through Ordinance 1/2025, reclassified the area as a Special Use Zone, removing it from a list of 12 environmental zones protected from residential development. This change, driven by Bandex and the Dominican government, allows for the construction to proceed despite opposition from some local residents and a legal challenge filed by City Council member Nerys Martínez, who represents the Fuerza del Pueblo.
Martínez argues that the ordinance was approved without proper transparency and that the underlying decrees transferring ownership to Bandex were concealed. She also raises concerns about the potential risks of allowing Bandex, as a financial institution, to control such a valuable property asset.
The original 2009 decree signed by then-President Leonel Fernández transferred the “adjacent” lands to Bandex (then known as BNV) for the explicit purpose of developing a real estate project. This includes 118,089.91 square meters encompassing the stadium, the Teo Cruz Coliseum, the National Institute of Land Transport headquarters (Intrant), and surrounding parking areas.
The project’s design, already developed by Bandex and local investors, includes a Dominican Baseball History Museum along with office towers, a shopping center, hotel, convention center, apartments, and parking facilities. President Danilo Medina reaffirmed the project in 2014 with another decree specifying the plots’ cadastral designation.
The Quisqueya Ball Park is long due to a major expansion. It is not clear what impact the real estate development will have on the capital city’s stadium.
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Diario Libre
19 May 2025