In recent years, Saudi Arabia has been working on a huge infrastructure project launched by its leader Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (or MBS) hopes to transform the kingdom and its relationship with the outside world. The Neom Project is a series of construction projects currently under construction in the Tabuk region of the country. Saudi leaders hope the project will attract foreign visitors while contributing to the modernization of the country through innovative technological developments and applications.
The most important of the development projects associated with Neom is The Line, a planned 105-mile-long city that would run along the coast of the Dead Sea. The city, which developers originally predicted could accommodate up to 9 million people by 2030, is currently under construction. The foundation stone for the project was officially laid two years ago, and since then the Saudis have been racing to build their massive metropolis, which is estimated to cost up to $500 billion.
The designs for this city are intense, vast, and seem almost impossible to realize. The line itself is expected to be built higher than the Empire State Building over the desert. At the same time, the entire length of this structure is supported by a gigantic mirrored facade that runs its entire length. In addition, the city will have no cars or roads and will instead rely on a comprehensive rail system so that residents can live in an environmentally friendly environment.
“The designs unveiled today for the city’s vertically layered communities will challenge the traditional flat, horizontal cities and create a model for conservation and an improved quality of life for people,” Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman said in 2022, as that project was originally announced.
While developers have expressed that they hope to have much of the Neom project completed by 2039, things haven’t been going so smoothly recently. The wildly ambitious sci-fi dreams that animated the project seem to be dying, being replaced by more realistic plans. Here’s what happened to the project in recent months as the Saudis struggled to move forward with their faltering new desert metropolis.
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The Saudis are looking for new sources of income
To realize a project as big as Neom, you need a lot of money – and Saudi Arabia is currently somewhat weak in this regard. Therefore, the kingdom’s developers were looking for new sources of income to support the city’s further development. This week, Bloomberg reports that the country is hosting hundreds of bankers and investors in Neom, hoping to inspire them to pull out their wallets and write a few checks. The visits, led by Neom Chief Executive Officer Nadhmi Al-Nasr, are intended to stimulate interest in the project by “showing the actual work that takes place in Neom, rather than focusing on the virtual reality videos leave that developers have previously presented”. Meeting potential investors in foreign cities.
Plans for Neom were recently scaled back
With the Saudis looking for money, city planners have recently been forced to drastically reduce the project’s original size and scope. Bloomberg reported in early April that the city, which developers say is expected to be 170 kilometers long, will not be completed any time soon. A source close to the project told Bloomberg that authorities expect to build only about 1.5 miles (2.4 kilometers) of the city by 2030. As The Guardian notes, that’s a shocking 98 percent reduction. Presumably Saudi officials are still hoping to build the entire city, although they will need to pick up the pace if they don’t want to be under construction for the next century. The developers also originally had much more ambitious population growth projections. Initially, the project’s supporters had hoped that 1.5 million people would live in the city by 2030. Now they expect fewer than 300,000 people by then, writes Bloomberg.
Plans for the city are diverse (and strange)
This year alone, a number of new Neom-related projects have been announced. Fast Company points to the city’s increasingly “unhinged” creative iterations, including Trojena, a $500 billion luxury mountain resort, Zardun, a “luxury ecotourism” oasis destination, Treyam, a vacation destination on a futuristic bridge over a desert lagoon and many, many other promised installations straight out of Star Wars. If you want a complete overview of all the undone developments announced in the name of the Neom project, you can visit the project’s website, where you will find one press release after another promising visitors visually amazing, currently hypothetical, places .
The Saudis want China to help finance the new development
China is among the potential sources of revenue that could help the kingdom realize its bold city project. About a week ago, Saudi developers traveled to several Chinese cities, including Beijing, Hong Kong and Shanghai, to “court Chinese investors” for support in realizing the project, Business Insider reported.
However, it is unclear whether China is actually interested in helping. No agreements were announced as a result of the Saudi visits and Leonard Chan, chairman of the Hong Kong Innovative Technology Development Association, told a French news agency that reactions to the Saudi presentations were “mostly neutral.” Elaborating further on the development, Chan said: “I come over for fun but I won’t be living there. It’s like something out of ‘SimCity.’
There are also further changes in Vision 2030
The plans for Neom are part of the much broader state project Saudi Vision 2030, a master plan for the modernization and future-oriented development of the kingdom. However, it was recently reported that Saudi officials are concerned about the sheer cost of the Vision 2030 project. Earlier this month, Business Insider wrote that the costs of MBS’s vision were “beginning to raise concerns at the country’s highest levels of government.” It therefore seems likely that broader changes will need to be made to the Crown Prince’s agenda in the coming years – and not just in relation to The Line.
It is unclear when, if ever, people will actually live in Neom
When will people actually be able to live in Neom? Nobody really knows. City developers had hoped to flood the desert with futuristic fun-seekers sometime in the next few years. It’s looking more and more like this is more or less a pipe dream. There are small subprojects that are expected to be ready for human visitation relatively soon, but for the most part it is difficult to predict when humans will be able to live in this sprawling desert metropolis.
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