Developing a water park in Punta Cana: the 2011 opportunity, re-examined in 2026

In 2011 we came across an advertisement that we thought deserved an article of its own. Investors were wanted for a water-park development in Verón, between Bávaro and Punta Cana:

“The park will be built on 50,000 sqm (12.36 acres) and is only 300 meters from the main street Beron – Punta Cana… Interesting for the entire hotels in Uvero Alto, Bavaro and Punta Cana but also for the visitors coming from Santo Domingo… because of the highway under construction.” — the 2011 advertisement, as quoted in our article

We were enthusiastic: “everybody loves a waterpark”. We also said the obvious things. It would be expensive, it would need a strong team and good marketing, and results would take time. Fifteen years later we can check the assumptions behind that advert one by one.

Assumption 1: the visitors will be there. Correct.

In 2011 the Punta Cana boom was well under way. In 2025 the Dominican Republic received a record 11.68 million visitors. Of the 8.86 million who arrived by air, about half came through Punta Cana airport, roughly 5.4 million passengers. Cruise traffic added 2.82 million visitors nationwide, though most of it docks on the north coast and at La Romana rather than in Punta Cana.

The site’s location turned out to be exactly right. Verón is minutes from the airport and has become the corridor’s working town. It is where staff live, where the services are, and where land is still comparatively cheap. Caribe Scout tracks Verón as a live area, and its median asking price per m² is among the lowest in the corridor.

Assumption 2: the highway will bring Santo Domingo. Correct.

The “highway under construction” was the Autopista del Coral, opened in August 2012 between La Romana and Punta Cana. It completed a four-lane route from the capital, which is now about two and a half hours away. Dominican families from Santo Domingo, the largest city in the Caribbean, do come east for weekends and holidays. They are the one customer group no resort can capture with a pool slide.

Assumption 3: the hotels will send their guests. This is where it changed.

In 2011 a stand-alone water park could expect resort guests to come for a day out. Since then the resorts have built the water parks themselves:

• Club Med Punta Cana opened its own water park in December 2024, with slides, splash zones and family areas.
• Lopesan is opening a new resort next to Lopesan Costa Bávaro in 2026: about 1,000 rooms and a €320 million investment. Its water park has a wave pool, hydrotubes, free-fall slides and black-hole slides.
• Several other all-inclusive resorts in Bávaro and Uvero Alto now market splash parks as a core family amenity.

As one Caribbean travel publication put it in 2024, resorts have realised that “there’s no amenity that’s as compelling as a water park” for families. For a stand-alone park this is the central problem. The guests are in Punta Cana, but many of them now have slides at the hotel, included in the price.

What a stand-alone project would need to work in 2026

1. A customer the resorts don’t serve. That means Dominican families from Santo Domingo and the east, residents of the corridor’s fast-growing towns, cruise excursions from La Romana, and guests of the smaller hotels, condos and Airbnbs that have no pool slides. That last group is large and growing, because short-term rentals have spread through Bávaro and Verón.
2. A day-out experience a resort pool can’t match: scale, a wave pool, a lazy river, food, shade. It also needs a price that works for a Dominican family, not only a tourist.
3. Transport partnerships with tour operators and hotels without parks, and parking for the weekend drive-in market.
4. Incentives settled before the land is bought. Tourism projects approved by CONFOTUR under Law 158-01 can be exempt from income tax and from taxes on purchase and construction for up to 15 years. Approval depends on the project and the zone. A lawyer’s opinion costs little compared with the site.
5. Water, power and permits. A park consumes a lot of water and electricity. Get environmental permits, a water source and a grid connection on paper before you value the land as a water-park site.

How to test it before committing

• Count the competition. Map every resort water park within 30 minutes, and what a day pass costs where they sell them.
• Size the local market. Count the households in the Higüey–Verón–Bávaro area, and the weekend traffic from Santo Domingo.
• Price the land as land first. If the park never happens, what is 50,000 m² near Verón worth for housing or commercial use? That is your downside.
• Phase it. Start with a smaller splash park and food court that can grow, rather than building the full park on day one.

We ended our 2011 piece with “great things are accomplished through great effort”. The 2026 version: great things are accomplished through great effort and a customer the competition has left on the table. In Punta Cana that customer exists, but it is no longer the resort guest.

Related: the corridor’s areas and prices on Caribe Scout, from Verón to Bávaro, and our Punta Cana investment guide.