Azerbaijan may not be known as one of the world’s most popular and that’s perhaps one of the reasons why things are about to change there, perhaps in quite a drastic manner. This former Soviet State, with apopulation of about 8,000,000 is hoping that some of its planned changes will put it on the tourist map in the near future.

The nation lies to the south of Russia and sits next to the Caspian Sea’s west coastand just below the beautiful Caucasus Mountains. The capital city of Baku is home to about 2,000,000 people and is quite a historical and interesting destination.

One of the main reasons Azerbaijan is thinking about becoming more tourist friendly is because the nation is quite rich in oil. The money made from oil is being pumped back into the country so to say and there’s suddenly been a bit of a construction frenzy going on in attempt to modernize some aspects of the country and raise its tourist profile.

In fact, one of the projects that has tentatively been scheduled is the construction of the world’s tallest building. The project will see the structure, which may be called the Azerbaijan Tower, reach a total of 3,445 feet in the air, which would make it 722 feet taller than the Burj Khalifa in Dubai. Basically, you’d be looking at a tower that is about a kilometer tall and would consist of 189 floors.

In addition, Baku may also take another page out of Dubai’s book and build numerous artificial islands in the Caspian Sea as well as build a Formula One race track to attract auto racing fans from around the globe. This wealth in the nation is relatively quite new, but oil was struck there originally over 100 years ago.

The idea is to fill the local area of the Caspian Sea with 41 separate islands that will be connected to each other by a total of 150 bridges. Some of the local politicians are predicting that Baku will perhaps become the new Venice. They’re predicting that approximately a million people will be able to live on these manmade islands.

A man named Ibrahim Ibrahimov is behind the Baku project and he’s the head of a real estate development company known as Avesta. He’s also believed to be a close friend of President Ilham Aliyev. Ibrahimov recently stated that investors from America, Turkey, China, and Arab nations are interested in the project, which will likely cost at least $100 billion to complete.

However, you may not want to buy your plane ticket to Azerbaijan just yet, although there’s plenty to see and do in this wonderful country, as the project likely won’t be finished until some around 2020 to 2025. Construction work’s already underway on a new road system though which will feature the Formula One race track.

Baku was quite a popular destination within Russia when oil was first struck there more than 100 years ago, and it may well soon be just as glamorous now as it was then. Five-star hotels will soon be springing up and it could be very well one of the hottest destinations on the globe in the next decade or so.

Things are already heating up there as Azerbaijan will be hosting the popular Eurovision Song Contest this May and it will be an excellent opportunity for Baku to impress visitors and showcase the fine city.

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here

three × 3 =