One of Finland’s most flamboyant businessmen has revealed he plans to build an actual-sized copy of the legendary Titanic passenger ship on a piece of dry land in northern Finland. The giant ship will house a hotel and restaurants in a bid to lure more tourists to the northern areas of Finland.
“Everybody in Europe knows the Titanic. There are no tourist attractions in the Oulu region and I think it could attract tourists from abroad,” Toivo Sukari told the AFP news service. Sukari operates a furniture store chain called Masku and recently built a massive shopping centre named Ideapark near Tampere in southern Finland.
Sukari is now working on this new venture to build another shopping centre in the small village of Kiiminki, around 630km north of Helsinki. Although he could not tell the exact dimensions of the Titanic replica, the original was 269 metres long, 28 metres wide and 53 metres high.
“It could have a hotel and a number of restaurants inside,” Sukari commented to the AFP, adding that the cost would run between 30 and 40 million euros. He plans to make the new Titanic as true to the original as possible.
“I am sure Japanese tourists, who go skiing in Lapland, would be interested to see it,” he said. If everything goes to plan, construction on the ship will begin later this year and be ready for customers by November 2011.
[…] has “Titanic to live again…in Lapland?” Whatever happened to the TITANIC replicas that were in the planning stages around the […]
Yes, strawberry, Titan will be a working liner.
Please visit our site for the entire plan.
Thank you!
– Joseph Ricker
will people be able to take trips on the Titanic once again like before?
I feel that this project, if successfully finished (no pun intended) would certainly be a boost to the local economy, but probably won’t have the impact the developer is looking for.
In the end, in my opinion, its another sad case of someone trying to gain financially from the disaster that struck the Titanic so many years ago.
I have been working on a plan to bring Titanic back into the 21st century through Titan, a vessel built in honor and in memory of Titanic’s victims, while mirroring the ship herself with her appearance, and her interiors.
And we have organizaed our efforts as a non-profit, who seeks to utilize the massive profit potential of such a newbuild liner to affect real change in our world by assisting those who most need help in it – the many children who suffer from hunger, disease, and other maladies, including homelessness, abuse, and illiteracy.
Titan, it is envisioned, will be a ship of light and hope in what appears to be a dimming world.
I invite all to visit our site to view our plan, and I look forward to answering your questions.
Thank you!
Sincerely,
Joseph Ricker
Chairman
SS Titan Foundation