The futuristic NEOM megacity in Saudi Arabia, The Line, has been scaled back for now, reports claim.
As part of the $1.5 trillion NEOM mega-project, Saudi Arabia estimated that the futuristic city ‘The Line’ would be home to 1.5 million people by 2030.
However, those lofty estimates have now reportedly been scaled back to 300,000 in the medium term.
READ MORE! Skyscraper as tall as the Eiffel Tower to be built in Saudi Arabia’s desert ski resort
Bloomberg cited an unnamed source who’s close to the giga-project,
The $500 billion ‘cognitive city’ is planned to stretch across 170 kilometers (105 miles) of desert to the Red Sea in the northwest of Saudi Arabia.
However, the Bloomberg source close to the project claims that only 2.4 kilometers (1.5 miles) of that is expected to be completed by the 2030 deadline.
The 26,500 square-kilometers (10,200 square-mile) project, is just one giga-project within Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s Vision 2030 plan.
Funded by the country’s Public Investment Fund (PIF), the aim is to allow the kingdom’s economy to diversify away from oil.
Instead, the focus will be on tech and innovation.
This somewhat disappointing news comes hot on the heels of a more exciting update.
A video was posted to LinkedIn by Giles Pendleton, the chief operating officer of the project.
That video offered a glimpse into the astounding momentum and scale of The Line.
The colossal urban project transformed previous rhetoric surrounding The Line into tangible progress.
While envisioning the final form of the city remains a challenge – you can see where things are heading.
According to a previous video released by NEOM itself, the mega-project was ‘progressing rapidly’.
“Phase one will be complete in 2030”, said Denis Hickey, chief development officer of The Line at NEOM.
The stunning first-look progress pictures in the video gave an idea of just how rapidly progress was being made.
Hickey also spoke about how Saudi Arabia is committed to hitting ambitious development targets.
In fact, millions of cubic meters of earth and water are being moved every week for the behemoth.
Watch this space for further updates on the unprecedented and futuristic project.
