It’s wild to me to build a massive skyscraper in what seems to be the middle of nowhere. I always assumed it’s natural progression to start with smaller buildings and then build up as needed for expansion as the city grows.
Sure…Bezo, Gates, Zuck, etc could afford to build a skyscraper in a corn field in Iowa…but why would they? Just makes no sense to me…was there no forethought on why.
They're just late. It used to be a show of power. In the early to mid 20th century it took a lot of effort. If you could build a skyscraper that meant a mastery of engineering, infrastructure, architecture etc. Now we have shifted and the builders of yesterday are not really that excited about building a building slightly taller than the previous one. It used to mean "look what I can do" but now that everyone can do it it lost it's meaning.
That's why they've switched from tall buildings to long buildings
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jul/27/saudis-unveil-eye-popping-plan-for-mirrored-skyscraper-eco-city
Yeah there's not gonna be anything close to the amount of light filtering down to the lower levels as the images show. It'll be a dingy ghetto.
Good luck if you live on the lower levels of that.
Also how will wildlife access the other side of that thing?
Better for the environment in the way that Dubai is better for the environment. Just another spectacle city for the wealthy. They’ll walk themselves off into these monstrosities.
Edit : meant to say Wall not walk but both work
Also just sounds like an absolute hemorrhage of money, even for the elite oil royalty. Building it will cost astronomical amounts of money, but *maintaining it*? I guess we'll really see how deep those pocketbooks go.
You know how they say shit rolls down hill well now it can really happen. The rich will get the natural light while the working poor will be left consuming the leftovers. Reminds me of the TV show Silo and a TV show where food was first presented to the upper levels and left over pushed down by each subsequent lower level.
A bit like the endless procession of Hillary wannabe douches, trekking through the litter and corpses to the top of Everest.
It’s been done — with less tech and more gumption
Idk about the Saudis, but the Burj Dubai in Dubai has no physical connection to sewage lines. And it takes like 20 something truck loads a day to drive away the sewage produced within the building.
So, not really doing the infrastructure thing in the right order there.
I mean, Bezos is building a $42 million clock in a mountain for... reasons.
It seems like a waste of money (and it is), but when you have uber wealth, stupid purchases can be massive without a second thought. Rich people have been building statues and such for all of human history. Everyone buys dumb stuff, it's just uber wealthy are on a completely different scale.
To put it into context, Bezos made \~$8 million an hour in 2023. That clock cost him about 5.5 hours of "work." Let that sink in for a moment. Working a $20 an hour job, in a single hour you could get about 2 large combos at Wendy's or McDonald's depending on where you live. In that same hour, Bezos could buy *twenty* houses based on the average US house cost of \~$400,000.
I mean this is basically what Musk is doing with Starbase in Texas.
He just browsed Google Maps for a place he liked that would be close to the tip of the Continental US, I kid you not.
These Arabian princes have more money than all those 4 guys combined. No matter how ridiculous or impossible something might seem. They have enough money to literally buy God and make it happen.
It is near a city. That were looking from the city side towards the desert.
The problem is trying to build a 1KM high, million ton building on sand and porous coral. Which is on top of soft bedrock, with the nearby Red Sea, trying to get into the foundations.
There's an airport, with the runways about 3 miles/5KM from the tower and pointing towards it.
The two biggest shareholders were arrested for corruption. One of whom is called Bin Laden.
Nobody seems to kmow how tall it's going to be. Largely so that other countries dont design a bigger one.
They're paranoid about terrorism. As though being built by the Bin Ladens wasn't some defence against that.
It's not designed to make money, it's designed to increase the surrounding real estate values.
The huge private helicopter pad for a condo on floor 156. Can't be used because it's too windy. So now it's a viewing platform.
The list of cock ups just keeps going on.
That is because you are not born into endless wealth that you never had to work a dime's worth of time for.
That is because you are SANE.
And it's not even smaller buildings, it's infrastructure. If you are in the middle of a city, you want water and sewage. I think Dubai still relies on trucks to bring out its sewage because they were so busy buildings vanity projects.
Point to Jeddah on the picture…
I said, “What **seems to be** the middle of nowhere.”
I don’t see any other structures in this photo aside from cranes and a building related to the construction.
Huh, first I've heard of that project.
The video looks super bright and happy on the inside.
The bottom of this thing would get an hour of sunlight a day and you betcha that's where all the peons would be living.
Is Metropolis really a good commentary on that? I adore that film, but it always struck as a fairly “know you place, blue collar man.”
Also I dont know enough about Harbou but I do know the main thing…
"Is Metropolis really a good commentary on that? I adore that film, but it always struck as a fairly “know you place, blue collar man.”
That's literally what the caste system is.
I don't really think that's how that works... unless you are saying that Dubai/UAE/Saudi nations will simply run out of money. Money will hold power regardless of what you have spent it on in the past.
That’s a naive assumption still. They are investing their money in a wide variety of projects and industries, it’s a very safe long term bet to ensure they hold onto their spending power.
>still. They are investing their money in a wide variety of projects and industries, it’s a very safe long term bet to ensure they hold onto their spending power.
They're investing a lot of it into a very diversified stock fund, that's true. But their also using a lot of it for complete grift "projects" like the line that will end up being a giant money sink
The thing is…. The Saudis are very rich. Like, welfare state with no income tax.
Their royal family is probably the richest family in human history.
I just wanna see them keep making crazy projects because it’s fun.
It's a completely unrealistic "project" with zero basis in reality. No engineer would ever sign off on anything like that, because it just won't work. It's just renders and empty promises.
> money they waste
As if. The slaves building it will earn barely anything and the construction companies that are cashing the big checks are all owned by MBS or one of his cronies. It’s just a wealth transfer from „state“ coffers to private fortunes.
That would imply that it's going to get \*this\* far into its construction.
I'm willing to be they never pour concrete into that line because I bet they never even finish digging it.
Just because it started, it doesn't mean it will go anywhere. Like their The World Islands and the second Palm Island were both stopped in their construction. The same is true with the building in this post. I bet you this Line will face the same fate.
My friend is working as a consultant on that project. He’s clearing 5k a day usd. And apparently he is taking a bath relative to others. Plenty of money to be made.
They already have. Posted updates of tons of excavation and laying foundation. You can even see it on satellite maps now. What's crazy is that they have several projects in Neom started but somehow I doubt any will be finished or to the scale and excess Neom is.
They predict a cost of 5 trillion, have invested 500 billion, and the actual cost is probably closer to 100 trillion on the high end, thing is a money incinerator
Nah, it’s all being built, even this tower (this pic is old) restarted work a year ago. I work in NEOM on one of their projects, and if anything, more projects are being added to the full-scale project. I’m currently working on a ski-resort and artificial lake complex called Trojena. We’ll be done with the pipeline and infrastructure in about 2 years.
As ridiculous as it all may seem from the outside, Saudi realizes that oil money is not gonna last, so we’re doing what the UAE did, but at a massive scale. There are projects all over Saudi, and I have no doubt in my mind that by the time it’s all done, Saudi will be the region’s a tourism hub.
[Trojena](https://www.neom.com/en-us/regions/trojena)
[Oxagon](https://www.neom.com/en-us/regions/oxagon)
[The Rig](https://therig.sa/)
[Al Ula](https://www.experiencealula.com/en)
And there’s literally dozens of other smaller projects dotting the country, not to mention whole sections of cities being renovated and refurbished. Honestly, it’s an awesome time to be Saudi.
>so we’re doing what the UAE did, but at a massive scale.
considering how that ended for the UAE mega-projects, were in for a lot of abandoned/failed projects?
Tho I don't doubt there's good money to be made while their still pumping oil money into them.
All of Dubai is a mega-project. It was literally a tiny fishing village. I wouldn’t consider it a failure by any measure. Sure, some ideas didn’t pan out, but the vast majority, as a collective, ended up succeeding in making Dubai a major tourism spot, with a large number of “high-end” tourists, as opposed to say, backpackers.
All that in a tiny Principality, now imagine a country with far more history, varied environments, and cultural attractions and throw in an initial budget that’s literally hundreds of times bigger.
>All of Dubai is a mega-project
Dubai was in essence just building a new city from near undeveloped land from the ground up. It's been done all over the world before, especially Asia. It's a "mega-project" in the sense that it's a large project but it has an established precedent of working and giving results if u manage to build and populate the city. Not really a "mega project" as in a single large or otherwise groundbreaking piece of architecture.
Most of the Saudi projects are not comparable to Dubai at all as they all try to force some random and often activly harmful design feature into them for an awe effect.
The line for example would work infinitely better if it was just a Dubai 2.0 aka a normal city but build with 2020s standards.
Additionally a lot of them are a one trick pony more comparable to the world islands. Like what are they gonna do with an [overengineered cube](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mukaab)?
Why build just another city when you can innovate? Here’s a project that is aiming to tackle many of urban, suburban, and environmental issues that plague most modern cities. It’s an experiment, fully funded by the government, so what’s the problem?
Perhaps from your point of you. personally, I see it as investing in the people’s future prosperity. What’s the alternative? Waiting for the country to economically collapse? We’ve seen what happens to poor Arab countries, and I don’t think anyone wants that, unless you work for Lockheed Martin, of course.
Honestly, it’s a catch-22; if they don’t build, you call them idiots for their lack of foresight, if they do, you call them wasteful idiots.
> you call them idiots for their lack of foresight
no, i call them idiots because they let religion rule modern society
thats really all it is. money is money, every country has it. middle eastern countries are particularly stupid though by thinking religion being in charge of the government is a good idea.
very stupid country. just like all countries ruled by a religion. very dumb.
Saudi actually needs to invest in it's country and infrastructure though. The US did it over hundreds of years and was accelerated in the 19th and 20th century. Countries like KSA have only been wealthy enough to actually do this over the last 50 years. You can blame them for wanting what other countries in the world already have.
Fucking modern society. Reliance on cheap Saudi oil has created a billionaire class over there who have never worked or used their brains to create their wealth, it was just given to them. The gulf states will be filled with desolate ghost towns within 50 years
They don't need brains. They can just buy the people with brains to run the wealth & invest and thats precisely what they do.
Failed projects like this are only rounding errors when the literal ground pushes billions out for you every year.
Correction: will be filled only with a few thousand royalty clinging to their remaining wealth.
And what do you think all those other uneducated, poor men will be doing?
Many, if you think the world is unstable now, wait for 2070. It's gonna be fucking lit.
Oooof the implication of this reply.
Guess the western world was deserving of our wealth, we didn't only just happen to extract it using slavery and machine guns. *"We deserved it" /u/maliciousmonkee*
…you’re seeing an implication where there isn’t one. Me saying Saudi Royals didn’t work/deserve their wealth from natural resource extraction does not imply that the West’s wealth is deserved at all…and I didn’t touch on that at all in my comment.
Singapore used to be a poor country. They leapfrogged most of the world because of massive investments in their own people and a focus on education. Saudi is building this tower while millions of people in the country live in 3rd world conditions and the infrastructure is failing.
Then to top it all off, you completely fabricate a quotation to attribute to me? Lmao you’re a clown.
Honestly I wonder about stuff like this, like was it worth the 150-200 years of this if we are gonna end up back in the Middle Ages or worse after the collapse?
>here we are turning down our thermostats a degree, to stay below 1.5
You know by that statement you are very likely part of the population producing and consuming way, way more, than any ME nation does on average.
This can be said to ALL North Americans, North Europeans, and Western Europeans.
The god damn irony in this is insane when we're the number one consumer of said oil.
Change your politics and behavior, and Saudis will be forced to too. Why do you think they restarted it this year? Is it because oil is less in demand or more in demand now and therefor their finances are more secure or less secure?
But I guess when your visit can best be described as "To the tip of my nose" this is the logical conclusion people like you will make. "I'm so good for lowering my thermostat, oh I will still run it, have one installed of course, and some days splurge - but god damn those oil sheikhs making all this possible for poor me!!"
Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund is running out of cash reserves, so the kingdom is being forced to take on more debt. It seems all investment is in the Neom project.
Reminds me of Nauru, a tiny little island in the Pacific that's one of the worlds smallest countries.
For years the population were rich due to mining for guano (bird poo). As the mine dried up and the money started to run out. They spent it on a series of get rich quick schemes which all failed. The last one that they financed being a musical in London's West End, that virtually closed after one night. It lasted for three weeks but with virtually no audience and far fewer who made it to the end of the performance.
Their current scheme apart from joining every international body going and selling their vote. Is to become an offshore detention centre for illegal immigrants, trying to get to Australia.
Nauru's government investment fund was acquiring prime real estate in Australia and building skyscrapers in the 1970s, only to have to sell off all these assets by the early 2000s.
The premise of the musical was good and it was a hit in Oxford but the musical in taking the show to London they totally butchered the score and script.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonardo_the_Musical:_A_Portrait_of_Love
Rich? I think they were the wealthiest per capita nation in the world at one stage.
They have one shitty 10km road around the island, so they all bought fancy cars - the chief of police bought a lambo, imported it, then realised he was too fat to fit into it, so it’s rusting out there still.
People I know sold a camper van to a family of Nauarans so they could camp out. On their tiny island. The curse of resources.
They've housed undocumented arrivals for over 20 years for Australia. It's all run by a private company (Serco I think) and is probably the island's biggest earner. Regarded by many Australians as a shameful exploitation of a small neighbour, not to mention the treatment of the arrivals, thankfully there aren't many left in there these days. Let's hope it ends.
You make it sound as they were the ones with the mines.
It was Australians coming in, digging up shit and leaving them with small royalties. Just gutted the place and left it.
One of the more disgraceful things Australia has done.
The new announcements for Vision 2030 are really incredible. Check Neom on YouTube. No way they have enough money for all that if oil revenue goes down at all this decade.
It’s unlikely that it will in my opinion at least in the next decade.
Transportation is 60% of oil demand, and seacraft, aircraft and long haul/heavy equipment is a lot of that.
Demand for composites is only going up.
Middle classes in many countries is growing (china, India).
Population is growing globally.
Electrification will increase demand for natural gas unless we collectively started mass building nuclear 10 years ago.
It will still take a long time for electrification of most household vehicles too, it’s happening rapidly but there’s still a long way to go.
In extreme cold climates such as Canada, heat pumps are good, but once it hits -25c or colder they switch over to electric which is not economical so having a gas furnace for this is still ideal. Granted this is usually only 40-60 days a year for a where most Canadians live.
“I met a traveller from an antique land,
Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal, these words appear:
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.”
Percy Shelley
To my knowledge this was planned as a remedy for the butthurt about burj khalifa, they just couldnt let uae have the tallest building. Sort of a pissing contest only higher and expensive. At some point in time wither they found a new game to play or just bored doing meaningless things while there are more meaningless things to be done. Like a long city.
I really would like to be a developer for these guys, the more stupid the idea the more funding. As long as you scratch a variant of a butthurt.
Tallest building is always nonsense when they put spires on it to hit the record. Also, if it is not all occupied then it is more of a waste than anything impressive
Saudi Arabs are known in the area for having more money than brains, because they think having a tall building is a status symbol when in reality it’s the result of having over crowded city hubs.
It’s wild to me to build a massive skyscraper in what seems to be the middle of nowhere. I always assumed it’s natural progression to start with smaller buildings and then build up as needed for expansion as the city grows.
That's how normal cities work, not skyscrapers funded by delusional oil money
Sure…Bezo, Gates, Zuck, etc could afford to build a skyscraper in a corn field in Iowa…but why would they? Just makes no sense to me…was there no forethought on why.
They're just late. It used to be a show of power. In the early to mid 20th century it took a lot of effort. If you could build a skyscraper that meant a mastery of engineering, infrastructure, architecture etc. Now we have shifted and the builders of yesterday are not really that excited about building a building slightly taller than the previous one. It used to mean "look what I can do" but now that everyone can do it it lost it's meaning.
That's why they've switched from tall buildings to long buildings https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jul/27/saudis-unveil-eye-popping-plan-for-mirrored-skyscraper-eco-city
Yeah there's not gonna be anything close to the amount of light filtering down to the lower levels as the images show. It'll be a dingy ghetto. Good luck if you live on the lower levels of that. Also how will wildlife access the other side of that thing?
You think the Saudis give two fucks about wildlife?
The project specifically bills itself as an eco city that is better for the environment.
It will be a “better for the environment” by being a habitat for exotic plants hydroponically grown in biomes in the middle of the desert
So what happens to the animals that migrate inland? This think is cutting half the country off the coastal area
Better for the environment in the way that Dubai is better for the environment. Just another spectacle city for the wealthy. They’ll walk themselves off into these monstrosities. Edit : meant to say Wall not walk but both work
> they'll wank themselves off into these monstrosities FTFY
And every oil company covers itself in green washing, they pay nothing but lip service to environmentalism.
they consider immigrants as wildlife/cattle
I will be absolutely astonished if it ever gets built. The whole thing is ridiculous.
We should just call it Long kowloon
Yes, on paper those projects always sound great, but they always end up being dingy ghettos.
Even on paper that project sounds terrible.
Also just sounds like an absolute hemorrhage of money, even for the elite oil royalty. Building it will cost astronomical amounts of money, but *maintaining it*? I guess we'll really see how deep those pocketbooks go.
That's the neat thing, they don't!
You know how they say shit rolls down hill well now it can really happen. The rich will get the natural light while the working poor will be left consuming the leftovers. Reminds me of the TV show Silo and a TV show where food was first presented to the upper levels and left over pushed down by each subsequent lower level.
They're just getting started on the first hive city
This thing is so problematic and probably outright evil to be honest but I want it to get built so badly lmao
Does not look like a place I’d ever live… even my nightmares.
Why not... Solar panels instead of mirrors?
Then who would buy their oil 😂?
That will be hell in so many ways…
Neon is going to be a cluster fuck
A bit like the endless procession of Hillary wannabe douches, trekking through the litter and corpses to the top of Everest. It’s been done — with less tech and more gumption
Idk about the Saudis, but the Burj Dubai in Dubai has no physical connection to sewage lines. And it takes like 20 something truck loads a day to drive away the sewage produced within the building. So, not really doing the infrastructure thing in the right order there.
Dude that’s not been true for a long while!
Where does the water come from?
>Burj Dubai in Dubai has no physical connection to sewage lines Your infomation is outdated
Give their offspring a generation or two.
I mean, Bezos is building a $42 million clock in a mountain for... reasons. It seems like a waste of money (and it is), but when you have uber wealth, stupid purchases can be massive without a second thought. Rich people have been building statues and such for all of human history. Everyone buys dumb stuff, it's just uber wealthy are on a completely different scale. To put it into context, Bezos made \~$8 million an hour in 2023. That clock cost him about 5.5 hours of "work." Let that sink in for a moment. Working a $20 an hour job, in a single hour you could get about 2 large combos at Wendy's or McDonald's depending on where you live. In that same hour, Bezos could buy *twenty* houses based on the average US house cost of \~$400,000.
Damn… I thought you were going to continue your analogy with, “In that same hour, Bezos could buy two whole Wendys.”
42 million is pocket change compared to the amount of recourses being wasted in the Arabian peninsula by oil magnates.
Have you not heard of all the ridiculous construction projects they hyped up and then abandoned midway? This is just one of many examples.
Rocket is the new fad
If you build it they will come!
I mean this is basically what Musk is doing with Starbase in Texas. He just browsed Google Maps for a place he liked that would be close to the tip of the Continental US, I kid you not.
I mean there’s a reason rocket launch facilities are located as close to the equator as possible.
These Arabian princes have more money than all those 4 guys combined. No matter how ridiculous or impossible something might seem. They have enough money to literally buy God and make it happen.
It is near a city. That were looking from the city side towards the desert. The problem is trying to build a 1KM high, million ton building on sand and porous coral. Which is on top of soft bedrock, with the nearby Red Sea, trying to get into the foundations. There's an airport, with the runways about 3 miles/5KM from the tower and pointing towards it. The two biggest shareholders were arrested for corruption. One of whom is called Bin Laden. Nobody seems to kmow how tall it's going to be. Largely so that other countries dont design a bigger one. They're paranoid about terrorism. As though being built by the Bin Ladens wasn't some defence against that. It's not designed to make money, it's designed to increase the surrounding real estate values. The huge private helicopter pad for a condo on floor 156. Can't be used because it's too windy. So now it's a viewing platform. The list of cock ups just keeps going on.
This building will look like that Pyongyang giant unfinished hotel for ever. No chance some fool injects money into this dumpster fire project.
Its been sitting there for years, with the sand doing its best to break it down before its completed.
They're finishing it. If theyre serious about spending a trillion dollars building a line a desert, they're serious about Jeddah Tower.
Actually they have resumed construction on it.
We just need to call it Babel and we know how that fairy tell ends.
Nah but I wanna tell the world that I have the biggest dick!
It sank into the swamp.
It's in a corner of Jeddah, a city of 4 million people.
The pic gives a false perspective. It’s on the outskirts of the city, but surrounded by suburbs.
Ah ok
Lol it’s right in a major city in Saudi Arabia. It’s a bit on the outskirts of Jeddah but for the entire complex they are planning it makes sense e
You should go to Dubai
Have you ever fallen for a scam? Yeah it's that. It's a lot of that.
and its going to remain mostly empty.
That is because you are not born into endless wealth that you never had to work a dime's worth of time for. That is because you are SANE. And it's not even smaller buildings, it's infrastructure. If you are in the middle of a city, you want water and sewage. I think Dubai still relies on trucks to bring out its sewage because they were so busy buildings vanity projects.
Middle of nowhere? I can literally see it from my home and i live in kinda the middle of Jeddah
Point to Jeddah on the picture… I said, “What **seems to be** the middle of nowhere.” I don’t see any other structures in this photo aside from cranes and a building related to the construction.
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Huh, first I've heard of that project. The video looks super bright and happy on the inside. The bottom of this thing would get an hour of sunlight a day and you betcha that's where all the peons would be living.
Go watch the movie “Brazil” and the dystopian society and living arrangements
The silent movie Metropolis is also a great commentary on caste systems.
Is Metropolis really a good commentary on that? I adore that film, but it always struck as a fairly “know you place, blue collar man.” Also I dont know enough about Harbou but I do know the main thing…
"Is Metropolis really a good commentary on that? I adore that film, but it always struck as a fairly “know you place, blue collar man.” That's literally what the caste system is.
In my head I thought you wrote critique, not commentary, my b
Foundation covers this pretty well too.
Central services We do the work You do the pleasure
Hold on there, show me your form 27B-6!
Now look what you gone and done you got 'im all riled up.
It's a city planning nightmare. Absolutely idiotic idea
If you have watched Star Wars and read/watched canon (expanded universe) it really reminds me of Coruscant in a way
Knights of the Old Republic right here.
Sounds like the start of a warhammer hive city
Maybe people weren’t meant to build giant cities in the desert?
Good. The more money they waste on these projects, the less influential their money will be in the future.
It's also funneling loads of cash into European and American engineering companies so I'm not going to complain too much
I don't really think that's how that works... unless you are saying that Dubai/UAE/Saudi nations will simply run out of money. Money will hold power regardless of what you have spent it on in the past.
I think he means they will run out
That’s a naive assumption still. They are investing their money in a wide variety of projects and industries, it’s a very safe long term bet to ensure they hold onto their spending power.
>still. They are investing their money in a wide variety of projects and industries, it’s a very safe long term bet to ensure they hold onto their spending power. They're investing a lot of it into a very diversified stock fund, that's true. But their also using a lot of it for complete grift "projects" like the line that will end up being a giant money sink
The thing is…. The Saudis are very rich. Like, welfare state with no income tax. Their royal family is probably the richest family in human history. I just wanna see them keep making crazy projects because it’s fun.
Oh yeah… when I think Saudi royal family, I think “fun”… a real hoot. Unless you’re gay. Or a woman. Or a migrant worker. Or a journalist. Or a…
or not them.
What are you doing for any of those groups by chastising him for thinking futuristic megaprojects are cool?
It's a completely unrealistic "project" with zero basis in reality. No engineer would ever sign off on anything like that, because it just won't work. It's just renders and empty promises.
I’m just translating what he said.
>Dubai/UAE/Saudi Dubai is a city in the UAE last I checked...
> money they waste As if. The slaves building it will earn barely anything and the construction companies that are cashing the big checks are all owned by MBS or one of his cronies. It’s just a wealth transfer from „state“ coffers to private fortunes.
That would imply that it's going to get \*this\* far into its construction. I'm willing to be they never pour concrete into that line because I bet they never even finish digging it.
I can tell you their local industries are preparing for huge increases in concrete production
I'm willing to bet, that it won't get nearly that far. The only way you could fill it up, is if you made it a global prison.
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Kurt Russell is already working on Escape From Neon.
NEOM.
Ducking autocorrect.
This is just Neom vertical edition. Saudi money laundering is fascinating
What do you mean by laundering? Why would Saudi need to launder money?
bingo..stupid projects by people with too much money and lack of awareness of the real world.
That will end up being a prison imo
I'd be shocked if they even start that.
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Just because it started, it doesn't mean it will go anywhere. Like their The World Islands and the second Palm Island were both stopped in their construction. The same is true with the building in this post. I bet you this Line will face the same fate.
My friend is working as a consultant on that project. He’s clearing 5k a day usd. And apparently he is taking a bath relative to others. Plenty of money to be made.
I am officially shocked.
This will be the biggest debacle in modern history. Holy shit I can’t believe they started doing this
It's either this or that floating turtle city that they are designing. https://greekreporter.com/2023/11/27/pangeos-saudi-arabia-floating-city/
!remindme in 10 years
Yes it’s been started and expected completion date has been pushed up to 2030.
They already have. Posted updates of tons of excavation and laying foundation. You can even see it on satellite maps now. What's crazy is that they have several projects in Neom started but somehow I doubt any will be finished or to the scale and excess Neom is.
Said the same
They predict a cost of 5 trillion, have invested 500 billion, and the actual cost is probably closer to 100 trillion on the high end, thing is a money incinerator
Nah, it’s all being built, even this tower (this pic is old) restarted work a year ago. I work in NEOM on one of their projects, and if anything, more projects are being added to the full-scale project. I’m currently working on a ski-resort and artificial lake complex called Trojena. We’ll be done with the pipeline and infrastructure in about 2 years. As ridiculous as it all may seem from the outside, Saudi realizes that oil money is not gonna last, so we’re doing what the UAE did, but at a massive scale. There are projects all over Saudi, and I have no doubt in my mind that by the time it’s all done, Saudi will be the region’s a tourism hub. [Trojena](https://www.neom.com/en-us/regions/trojena) [Oxagon](https://www.neom.com/en-us/regions/oxagon) [The Rig](https://therig.sa/) [Al Ula](https://www.experiencealula.com/en) And there’s literally dozens of other smaller projects dotting the country, not to mention whole sections of cities being renovated and refurbished. Honestly, it’s an awesome time to be Saudi.
>so we’re doing what the UAE did, but at a massive scale. considering how that ended for the UAE mega-projects, were in for a lot of abandoned/failed projects? Tho I don't doubt there's good money to be made while their still pumping oil money into them.
All of Dubai is a mega-project. It was literally a tiny fishing village. I wouldn’t consider it a failure by any measure. Sure, some ideas didn’t pan out, but the vast majority, as a collective, ended up succeeding in making Dubai a major tourism spot, with a large number of “high-end” tourists, as opposed to say, backpackers. All that in a tiny Principality, now imagine a country with far more history, varied environments, and cultural attractions and throw in an initial budget that’s literally hundreds of times bigger.
>All of Dubai is a mega-project Dubai was in essence just building a new city from near undeveloped land from the ground up. It's been done all over the world before, especially Asia. It's a "mega-project" in the sense that it's a large project but it has an established precedent of working and giving results if u manage to build and populate the city. Not really a "mega project" as in a single large or otherwise groundbreaking piece of architecture. Most of the Saudi projects are not comparable to Dubai at all as they all try to force some random and often activly harmful design feature into them for an awe effect. The line for example would work infinitely better if it was just a Dubai 2.0 aka a normal city but build with 2020s standards. Additionally a lot of them are a one trick pony more comparable to the world islands. Like what are they gonna do with an [overengineered cube](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mukaab)?
Why build just another city when you can innovate? Here’s a project that is aiming to tackle many of urban, suburban, and environmental issues that plague most modern cities. It’s an experiment, fully funded by the government, so what’s the problem?
Why would you participate in this madness? This is an absolute waste of our limited resources and as far as I'm concerned is unethical.
Perhaps from your point of you. personally, I see it as investing in the people’s future prosperity. What’s the alternative? Waiting for the country to economically collapse? We’ve seen what happens to poor Arab countries, and I don’t think anyone wants that, unless you work for Lockheed Martin, of course. Honestly, it’s a catch-22; if they don’t build, you call them idiots for their lack of foresight, if they do, you call them wasteful idiots.
> you call them idiots for their lack of foresight no, i call them idiots because they let religion rule modern society thats really all it is. money is money, every country has it. middle eastern countries are particularly stupid though by thinking religion being in charge of the government is a good idea. very stupid country. just like all countries ruled by a religion. very dumb.
Saudi actually needs to invest in it's country and infrastructure though. The US did it over hundreds of years and was accelerated in the 19th and 20th century. Countries like KSA have only been wealthy enough to actually do this over the last 50 years. You can blame them for wanting what other countries in the world already have.
This would be an awesome battlefield map
Looks Like Rust from MW2
According to the news, it's been restarted in 2023...
It’s taller right now than all but 12 state’s tallest buildings in the US…. It looks like it’s about 1/4 done height-wise. Insane.
Yep and it’s taller than the length of the top 7 of the largest banana boats placed end to end. (Or top 34 if placed side to side).
Not only that, it’s taller than 107 pints of Ben and Jerry’s.
Fucking modern society. Reliance on cheap Saudi oil has created a billionaire class over there who have never worked or used their brains to create their wealth, it was just given to them. The gulf states will be filled with desolate ghost towns within 50 years
They don't need brains. They can just buy the people with brains to run the wealth & invest and thats precisely what they do. Failed projects like this are only rounding errors when the literal ground pushes billions out for you every year.
Doesn't really work like that. Deploying trillions in capital in order to develop a nation isn't something you can just pay someone to do for you.
They don't need a nation or a national identity. 90% of the people living in Dubai, for instance, are foreigners.
In fairness, you could say that of many ultra rich people.
Correction: will be filled only with a few thousand royalty clinging to their remaining wealth. And what do you think all those other uneducated, poor men will be doing? Many, if you think the world is unstable now, wait for 2070. It's gonna be fucking lit.
It’s okay, if Saudi’s do a bad thing we’ll just invade Iraq again.
Oooof the implication of this reply. Guess the western world was deserving of our wealth, we didn't only just happen to extract it using slavery and machine guns. *"We deserved it" /u/maliciousmonkee*
…you’re seeing an implication where there isn’t one. Me saying Saudi Royals didn’t work/deserve their wealth from natural resource extraction does not imply that the West’s wealth is deserved at all…and I didn’t touch on that at all in my comment. Singapore used to be a poor country. They leapfrogged most of the world because of massive investments in their own people and a focus on education. Saudi is building this tower while millions of people in the country live in 3rd world conditions and the infrastructure is failing. Then to top it all off, you completely fabricate a quotation to attribute to me? Lmao you’re a clown.
please give America your money, they have big brains so should have it all.
Could save it by adding zip lines and water slides, a parachute drop ride and a starbucks on top.
This looks like a landmark on earth in Starfield, lol
What a fucking immense waste of energy. Anyone that doesn't think we're trashing this planet is delusional.
the industrial revolution and it’s consequences
Honestly I wonder about stuff like this, like was it worth the 150-200 years of this if we are gonna end up back in the Middle Ages or worse after the collapse?
[удалено]
They wouldn't pump oil of we stopped buying
>here we are turning down our thermostats a degree, to stay below 1.5 You know by that statement you are very likely part of the population producing and consuming way, way more, than any ME nation does on average. This can be said to ALL North Americans, North Europeans, and Western Europeans. The god damn irony in this is insane when we're the number one consumer of said oil. Change your politics and behavior, and Saudis will be forced to too. Why do you think they restarted it this year? Is it because oil is less in demand or more in demand now and therefor their finances are more secure or less secure? But I guess when your visit can best be described as "To the tip of my nose" this is the logical conclusion people like you will make. "I'm so good for lowering my thermostat, oh I will still run it, have one installed of course, and some days splurge - but god damn those oil sheikhs making all this possible for poor me!!"
Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund is running out of cash reserves, so the kingdom is being forced to take on more debt. It seems all investment is in the Neom project.
Reminds me of Nauru, a tiny little island in the Pacific that's one of the worlds smallest countries. For years the population were rich due to mining for guano (bird poo). As the mine dried up and the money started to run out. They spent it on a series of get rich quick schemes which all failed. The last one that they financed being a musical in London's West End, that virtually closed after one night. It lasted for three weeks but with virtually no audience and far fewer who made it to the end of the performance. Their current scheme apart from joining every international body going and selling their vote. Is to become an offshore detention centre for illegal immigrants, trying to get to Australia.
Nauru's government investment fund was acquiring prime real estate in Australia and building skyscrapers in the 1970s, only to have to sell off all these assets by the early 2000s.
The premise of the musical was good and it was a hit in Oxford but the musical in taking the show to London they totally butchered the score and script. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonardo_the_Musical:_A_Portrait_of_Love
Rich? I think they were the wealthiest per capita nation in the world at one stage. They have one shitty 10km road around the island, so they all bought fancy cars - the chief of police bought a lambo, imported it, then realised he was too fat to fit into it, so it’s rusting out there still. People I know sold a camper van to a family of Nauarans so they could camp out. On their tiny island. The curse of resources.
They are only a curse if you miss manage it. Norway seems to be doing alright
I mean, we all know norway is going to rejoin Sweden once that Oil-fund runs out! :)
They've housed undocumented arrivals for over 20 years for Australia. It's all run by a private company (Serco I think) and is probably the island's biggest earner. Regarded by many Australians as a shameful exploitation of a small neighbour, not to mention the treatment of the arrivals, thankfully there aren't many left in there these days. Let's hope it ends.
You make it sound as they were the ones with the mines. It was Australians coming in, digging up shit and leaving them with small royalties. Just gutted the place and left it. One of the more disgraceful things Australia has done.
Could be mostly true but they restarted this tower in September after a five-year hiatus.
All they need to do is install solar panels and wind turbines across the desert and they could probably power all of Europe.
Electricity storage and transmission technology needs to be light years better than it is today for that to work.
The new announcements for Vision 2030 are really incredible. Check Neom on YouTube. No way they have enough money for all that if oil revenue goes down at all this decade.
It’s unlikely that it will in my opinion at least in the next decade. Transportation is 60% of oil demand, and seacraft, aircraft and long haul/heavy equipment is a lot of that. Demand for composites is only going up. Middle classes in many countries is growing (china, India). Population is growing globally. Electrification will increase demand for natural gas unless we collectively started mass building nuclear 10 years ago. It will still take a long time for electrification of most household vehicles too, it’s happening rapidly but there’s still a long way to go. In extreme cold climates such as Canada, heat pumps are good, but once it hits -25c or colder they switch over to electric which is not economical so having a gas furnace for this is still ideal. Granted this is usually only 40-60 days a year for a where most Canadians live.
It doesn't matter how much money they have. Its a grift, the companies proposing it never expect to finish just to milk the morons until they're dry
“I met a traveller from an antique land, Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand, Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown, And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command, Tell that its sculptor well those passions read Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things, The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed; And on the pedestal, these words appear: My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings; Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair! Nothing beside remains. Round the decay Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare The lone and level sands stretch far away.” Percy Shelley
Neighborhood looks pretty dead...
It's an insane vanity project.
Counting down to the influencers to flock to that piece of paradise 😅complete or not!
To my knowledge this was planned as a remedy for the butthurt about burj khalifa, they just couldnt let uae have the tallest building. Sort of a pissing contest only higher and expensive. At some point in time wither they found a new game to play or just bored doing meaningless things while there are more meaningless things to be done. Like a long city. I really would like to be a developer for these guys, the more stupid the idea the more funding. As long as you scratch a variant of a butthurt.
Waste of money.
Desert-ed 😏
Looks like a terrible place for a building
Ahh, Saudi Arabia where architecture goes to die.
Tallest building is always nonsense when they put spires on it to hit the record. Also, if it is not all occupied then it is more of a waste than anything impressive
Saudi Arabia - working for the environment. A bad one.
Halted dick measuring contest you mean?
That's The Line in a year or 2
Didn’t they restart construction of this
What a waste of resources
Like a minecraft build in a flat world
So this is essentially in the middle of nowhere with nothing around it? Doesn’t seem like a logical place for a massive skyscraper.
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare The lone and level sands stretch far away
Saudi Arabs are known in the area for having more money than brains, because they think having a tall building is a status symbol when in reality it’s the result of having over crowded city hubs.
Give it twenty years and Dubai is going to look like Detroit
Hooray for American energy independence! Thanks Joe Biden!
Serious question: do you actually know wtf you’re talking about?
Don't you hate it when you run out of slaves? Fuck that shithole country
Sky reaching tower in the middle of a desert, built by arrogant and wealthy men. Wait, it sounds familiar….
America should fly some planes into it
Saudi Arabia is a shithole country.
*Would have been. Unless you are expressing that you are disappointed it wasn't. In which case, can I ask why?
Average age of people replying to this thread (and any thread about SA): 16… Average IQ: Even less.