Al Dafna

Al Dafna (Arabic: الدفنة) is a seaside district of the Qatari capital Doha located on the Persian Gulf. The district is rapidly developing into a central business district, and since the late 1990s dozens of skyscrapers have risen in the district, with over fifty more planned. The district is also home to the City Center mall, one of the Middle East's largest malls. The district was created in the mid-1980s following a massive land reclamation project along Doha's coastline, and started to develop in the mid-1990s. Currently, Al Dafna is rapidly becoming Doha's new downtown district and, with the massive amount of recent development towards the north of Doha, it is also rapidly becoming the new centre of the city. Housing in the district is mainly up-scale apartments and many foreign consuls reside here. In Arabic, dafna roughly means "dredged land", a reference to the fact that the district was built upon reclaimed land. The decision to reclaim the land which would eventually become Al Dafna was first proposed in the 1970s after the government had difficulties in negotiating with land-owning tribes in downtown Doha. Rather than force the tribes to sell their lands, the government decided that the most feasible option was to initiate a massive dredging project along Doha's coastline. This project was underway from 1978 to 1981.