Work on young professional section begins at Silica City

Work has commenced in the young professional section of Silica City, Guyana’s first smart urban centre located along the Soesdyke-Linden Highway.
This update was provided by President Irfaan Ali on social media. Preparatory work is ongoing at the site, to map out the construction of roads and the various infrastructure which will encompass this section.
The first phase of the project will see an initial 400 young professional homes being constructed.
In February, a $2.1 billion contract was inked to develop Silica City. It is envisioned that over the next two decades, this new city along the Linden-Soesdyke Highway will grow to hold more than 12,500 households. The new city is intended to be one of the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) Government’s climate change mitigation strategies.
It will initially cater to just over 3000 households in the first five years but 3800 acres of land has been earmarked for the new city, and designs for the first phase of the project will begin this year.

The city will be a smart one, powered by renewable energy and developed with the Low Carbon Development Strategy (LCDS), the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and Goal 11 of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
Silica City is a development the PPP/C Government had initiated talks on prior to leaving office in 2015, but which was never continued under the succeeding A Partnership for National Unity/Alliance For Change (APNU/AFC) coalition Government.
In his first year in office in 2020, President Dr Irfaan Ali had revealed that Government had begun discussions on Silica City as a secondary city. He had explained that the Government was looking at an area on the Linden-Soesdyke Highway that would be connected to the new four-lane bypass road.
He had further noted that as development and expansion continued, there would be more occupation of the outskirts of Georgetown, and the country must be prepared for it. As a result, Government will be putting plans in place to ensure that such growth and development will be facilitated.
President Ali had also explained that the idea was not new, but was in the pipeline since he was Housing and Water Minister years ago, when the concept of Silica City was introduced at a Building Expo. In fact, talk of Silica City began as early as 2013, under the previous PPP/C Government.