A total of 85,000 new jobs will be created in the wider and directly surrounding area of the new airport, or so the business development agencies of Berlin believes, as does the borough of Treptow-Köpenick which directly borders on the BER airport grounds. Moreover, official estimates put the incoming migration into the airport region at 125,000 new arrivals. This goes to show: Even with just 30 million passengers per year, BER is a major economic factor in the region. “We may not hit that number yet by the time the coronavirus pandemic eases in 2022, but it is within reach and qualifies as near-term goal,” said Rainer Schorr, Managing Director of PRS Family Trust GmbH. “So far, the radically reduced level of air traffic means that the new airport does not have to start at full capacity, but can take its time getting up to speed. I’m sure it comes as a relief to many of the people in charge.”
For the time being, the economic boom associable with BER is taking mainly the form of rather brisk construction and planning activity. A good case in point is the Gatelands Kienberg Business Park. At its site of 100,000 square metres, located halfway between the new BER airport and the legacy airport, Schönefeld (SFX), a total of 267,000 square metres of gross floor area is to be developed in the years ahead. This would be the equivalent of one third of Berlin’s annual office take-up, except that Gatelands Kienberg lies just beyond the city limits, in the state of Brandenburg. One of the first projects at the site is Flexgate by FAY projects, a seven-storey office building with 14,300 square metres of lettable area and 85 underground parking spots that is slated for completion by 2022, with some of its units already let by the time construction started.
Cause for Confidence
Despite COVID-19, there is confidence in the business community as well as among investors and policymakers. Oliver Igel (Social Democrats), the borough mayor of Treptow-Köpenick in Berlin, is convinced that the Tesla plant and, of course, the opening of BER will generate noticeable impulses in the region – with all the consequences this will have for real estate prices and for office and commercial rents. Igel’s assessment is based on market analyses that indicate a rapid rise in demand for offices and a gathering pace in property and land development projects. Take, for example, the survey commissioned by PRS Family Trust, according to which prices for development land within the city limits of Schönefeld alone have increased by 60 percent since 2018. This is up from a growth rate of just 47 percent between 2012 and 2018. “The price trend illustrates that a large number of investors and property developers took a wary view of the location after the opening of BER had been postponed several times,” said Rainer Schorr. “Only when the office boom in Berlin gathered momentum and the completion date of the airport was credibly confirmed, projects around Schönefeld began to be kicked off in significant numbers.”
PRS Family Trust has been active at the airport location in Schönefeld since 2018 and is developing three large-size areas in the vicinity of BER. According to Schorr, demand for space is mainly generated by the logistics sector as well as by property developers for airport-related services. “At the moment, commercial developments dominate the building activity. But the creation of new jobs will seriously push up demand for residential real estate as well. This will imply further price hikes on the property market. We assume that land prices will rise by more than 50 percent before the end of 2021,” said Rainer Schorr, adding: “The rent level will adapt to that of inner-city locations.”
Growth even Ahead of Airport Completion
Several locations registered dynamic growth well ahead of the airport’s completion. A case in point is the town of Schönefeld, whose population increased from barely 3,000 in the year 2000 to 17,000 at the last count, and is likely to more or less double again in the coming years, according to a forecast done by Marcus Buder, real estate expert at Landesbank Berlin. But even within Berlin, the BER boom is clearly felt: e.g. in Adlershof, four kilometres inside the city limits, where an entire science city on over four square kilometres has already become home to nearly 1,200 companies with more than 23,500 employees and around 6,500 students. Mareike Lechner, member of the management board at Berliner immobilen-experten-ag. is convinced that this area, which straddles the access route from airport to inner city, has already proven to be a “globally attractive site” for corporates relocating to Berlin. In anticipation of the new airport, her company has been active in Adlershof since 2010. At the time, no one could have imagined how long they would have to wait for BER to go live, as Lechner remembers, adding: “But we stayed nonetheless. And are glad now we did.” The company is currently involved in three projects in Adlershof with a combined floor area of 150,000 square metres. One of them, called Oktogon, represents an entire business campus that is to be completed by 2025.
Impulses Reaching Deep into Brandenburg
As it were, the evolution of the German capital as a whole is shifting toward the south-east of the city, aligning its orientation with the airport location and penetrating deep into the state of Brandenburg. Regions like Teltow-Fläming district or Dahme-Spreewald district have long started benefiting from the airport project. The Dahme-Spreewald district, for instance, has now become the most sought-after location within the Berlin metro region because of its proximity and direct access to the airport by road, rail and waterway. Königs Wusterhausen, with nearly 40,000 residents now the most populous town in the district, and the municipalities of Schönefeld and Wildau have become growth hotspot in the district whose economic performance is approaching the West-German average even today. Its economic structure is defined by the aerospace industry, logistics, tourism and metalworking as much as by research institutes, two higher education institutions and the Science and Technology Park in Wildau. However, the economic boom, the proximity to Berlin and to the airport are all driving up office, commercial and residential rents along with land prices, which are fast closing in on Berlin’s level.
