Report says Saudi Arabia’s ‘The Line’ project has changed massively
- The Line has been scaled back for now, reports claim
- Saudi Arabia estimated that the futuristic city would be home to 1.5 million people by 2030
- However, those estimates have now been scaled back to 300,000 in the medium term
Published on Apr 08, 2024 at 4:48 PM (UTC+4)
by Amelia Jean Hershman-Jones
Last updated on Apr 08, 2024 at 7:32 PM (UTC+4)
Edited by
Tom Wood
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.
DISCOVER SBX CARS: The global premium car auction platform powered by Supercar Blondie
All Supercar Blondie contributors undergo editorial review and fact-checking to ensure accuracy and authority in automotive journalism. After gaining her BA Hons in French and English at the University of Nottingham, Amelia embarked on a vocational diploma from the National Council for the Training of Journalists (NCTJ). This led to numerous opportunities, from interning at Vogue to being on the small team that launched Women’s Health magazine in the UK, which was named the PPA Consumer magazine of the year for three years running. As Health, Beauty and Fitness editor, Amelia personally received a Johnson & Johnson Award and was shortlisted for both PPA and BSME titles. Since then, Amelia has created content for numerous titles and brands, including the Telegraph, 111 Skin, Waitrose, Red magazine, Stylist, and Elle, as well as being Head of Content at Vitality and Editor in Chief at INLondon magazine. “My superpower is translating technical jargon about the mechanical workings of a supercar into a relatable story you’ll want to share with your friends after you’ve read it.” After joining the SB Media family as a senior journalist in September of 2023, Amelia’s role has evolved to see her heading up the SEO output of the editorial team. From researching the most ‘Google-able’ key terms to producing evergreen content - it’s been a time of hard work, growth, and success for the editorial team and the Supercar Blondie website. “I like to think of myself as a ‘method journalist’. In other words: I live and breathe whatever I am writing about. When writing about fitness, I trained as a personal trainer, and as a beauty editor, I completed an ‘expert’ in scent diploma with the Fragrance Foundation. “During my tenure at Supercar Blondie, however, I did something I never thought possible: I passed my driving test at the age of 36. One day I’d love to train as a mechanic to better understand what happens under the hood, too. “My sweet spot is providing readers with a ‘takeaway’ (read: something new they didn’t know before) after reading every one of my stories. While I don’t claim to be an expert in the automotive world, I know the experts and bodies in the field to rely on to provide our readers with an informative and thought-provoking story every time they visit the site.”
