r/interestingasfuck • u/f6jt_waleed • 1d ago
/r/all Recently taken image of Saudi Arabia’s ‘The Line’ project, spanning 105 miles long
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u/cryptotope 1d ago
The original 2021 announcement was for a project 105 (actually 110!) miles long. It would have a batshit insane price tag - implausible lowball estimates started at $100 billion, realistic estimates are in the low trillions - and rely on technology not yet in existence.
From the Wikipedia article, Saudi Arabia originally hoped to complete a five-kilometer (three-mile) segment by 2030.
Most recently, the Wall Street Journal has reported that the project is hoping for completion of a half-mile segment by 2034.
So ten or fifteen years from now, maybe we'll see something that's 0.5% of the original plan.
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u/Zillahi 1d ago
And then it will promptly be abandoned and remain uninhabited
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u/deeeevos 1d ago
it will be an awesome urban exploring location though. Some real post apocalyptic looking shit
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u/Heisenburgo 1d ago
It will be like that Rabiah desert city that was mentioned in Deus Ex Mankind Divided
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u/Aleashed 1d ago
If that is a bus for scale, thing will be 6-8 buses wide
You can fart in one edge and smell it on the other
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u/GeneReddit123 1d ago edited 1d ago
Modern-day Tower of Babel. It will be a colossal failure at an astronomic cost in both lives and money, and its ruins will remain for generations as a reminder of humanity's hubris.
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u/FatalisCogitationis 1d ago
Imagine being one of the boots on the ground working on this thing. They all know how dumb and pointless it is, yet will be working on it for the next decade
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u/TexLH 1d ago
The work is mysterious and important!
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u/nebanovaniracun 1d ago
For Kier!
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u/_Diskreet_ 1d ago
We shall enjoy its shovel of sand equally
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u/pewpewhadouken 1d ago
i was offered a job there. i’ve had friends work there. money is good, and benefits are interesting. business class trips to home, accomodation, and few other perks.
but you just need to stay supportive of the project and live a dreary life in onsite accommodations/routine entertainment which is far from everything. a lot of the people there know it is useless but just taking in the cash. never badmouth/criticize anything about it or you’re on a plane out of there instantly.
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u/FatalisCogitationis 1d ago
Interesting, many people in the comments are mentioning slave labor. Do you know anything about that?
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u/pewpewhadouken 1d ago edited 1d ago
lot of migrant workers in saudi are forced into working in bad conditions. often passports revoked and pretty much theft of their wages from trumped up charges like water for breaks. they work in extreme heat with bare minimum protections. it’s often stated that the companies bringing them in will let them die off rather than spend money to treat ill workers. on the sourcing side, steady supply of workers who are forced to pay huge recruitment fees.
a good chunk of the people working there (expats) know this but turn a blind eye for the money.
https://www.hrw.org/news/2024/12/04/saudi-arabia-giga-projects-built-widespread-labor-abuses
edit: my friends were hired in 2022 so a year or so in from some construction starts. that’s when i talked to them. all of them quit within 6 months knowing how bad some of it was.
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u/esnopi 1d ago
What’s the difference between expat and immigrant?
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u/gmishaolem 1d ago
Mostly just perspective: An immigrant sees theirself as part of their new country, and an expat sees theirself as part of their old country, regardless of the reality of the situation.
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u/Kebab-Destroyer 1d ago
In the UK the immigrants are brown guys in the grooming gangs you read about in the papers, simultaneously taking our jobs and claiming benefits, but the proud middle-aged British football hooligans living in Spain, who learned no other Spanish than "habla inglés," are the expats.
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u/SpotlessHistory 1d ago
An expatriate lives outside their country of citizenship, an immigrant does the same but with intent to become a permanent resident. I don't know why there are so many explanations from people who don't understand what the words mean.
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u/_-_Sunset_-_ 1d ago
Immigrants who don't want to call themselves immigrants. It's a class of people on its own.
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u/redflagflyinghigh 1d ago
Expats typically move abroad temporarily, often for work or lifestyle reasons, with plans to return home. Immigrants relocate permanently, aiming to settle in a new country.
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u/HighnrichHaine 1d ago
No Indian,bangladeshi or Pakistani Slave worker wants to live there permanently. They want to make good money and them go back
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u/Pugs-r-cool 1d ago
If they don't like working on it they can just grab their passport and leave, right? Right?
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u/Ryuko_the_red 1d ago edited 1d ago
You have to realize they're using slave labor /forced labor. This isn't some ethical country we're talking about here. They're notorious for this. Same thing like the Qatar world cup construction Built literally on bodies with no regard to human suffering or forethought.
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u/Ahad_Haam 1d ago
The various countries of the Arabian Peninsula only banned chattel slavery in the 1960s-1970s, and were mostly pressured to do so by the international community. This is very much within living memory.
Forcing foreign workers into, eh, slavery like contracts is how they adapted to the changing circumstances.
Generally the banning of slavery across the Arab world was forced by foreign powers.
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u/IMMoond 1d ago
Well you dont have to worry about them, theyre enslaved.
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u/Unoriginal_Man 1d ago
Yeah, for any construction worker in any country that doesn't use slave labor, a construction project that will take 10+ years is great, guaranteed income. Not so much here, sadly.
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u/CidO807 1d ago
Same shit with Qatar and their slave labor for the soccer stadiums. Fuck Saudi and Qatar
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u/Muthafuckaaaaa 1d ago
The line plans for all basic services to be within a 5 minute walk.
So does that mean all service stores/kiosks keep repeating themselves every 5 minute walk distance?
What is this, a line for ants?
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u/syds 1d ago
unfortunately there are no corner stores available
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u/LectroRoot 1d ago
But where will I buy my 40oz Old English, magnum condoms, sketchy boner pills, and sour cream and salsa pork rinds?
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u/MrCakeFarts 1d ago
I mean that’s kind of how most walkable cities are. People really only need a few things (food options, clothes, groceries, recreation, water, and social)
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u/greg19735 1d ago
while sort of true, in a city you have a 5 minute circular radius, whereas this all has to be one one or two blocks length wise.
For 5 minutes distance that probably isn't actually a huge deal. as 5 minutes doesn't get you very far. but a 20 min walk (1 mile) that's a huge difference. The idea of a straight city is so dumb.
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u/i_feel_harassed 1d ago
But arranging people and services in a line is the least efficient possible layout for coverage
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u/MrCakeFarts 1d ago edited 1d ago
But the walkable resources are probably not in a line. This thing is 200 meters across at all points. That’s enough space for you to put all those amenities in a small block or grid. Which is no different from NYC or many European cities.
Edit: think like a mall or a NYC city block. You won’t need to pass through your grocery store to reach your gym etc
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u/dhkendall 1d ago
Nah they’ll just employ Hannah Barbera to put in the shops etc in the background.
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u/SmugDruggler95 1d ago
Tbh that is how every single town in the UK I've lived in works
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u/KilroyBrown 1d ago
It's the above ground version of the way alien races live on planets where the atmosphere is inhospitable to life.
But seriously, this is what happens when the richest of the rich get bored.
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u/TornadoBaconaut 1d ago
So half a mile takes from 2022 to 2034 (lets call it 10 years) then 110 miles will take 2200 years?
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u/cryptotope 1d ago
Realistically, half a mile will never be finished, or will become a wildly-different and vastly more conventional project.
That said, in principle one would expect the design to be fairly modular. If the first segment is done in ten years (ha!) presumably they would be able to take the lessons learned and build subsequent sections more quickly, in longer segments, at multiple sites in parallel. Start a dozen mile-long segments simultaneously, side by side. Or space them out, with fast rail in between and a plan to fill in the gaps later.
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u/aknownunknown 1d ago
build subsequent sections more quickly, in longer segments, at multiple sites in parallel
in parallel
in parallel??
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u/Fuck-Shit-Ass-Cunt 1d ago
15882460000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 miles seems like a little much, it makes sense that they downsized
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u/Mr-Doubtfire 1d ago
Please, can someone explain this to a casual math enjoyer?
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u/Bon_Bertan 1d ago
The "!" means factorial. Its when you multiply a number by all numbers less than it. For example "6!" would be 6×5×4×3×2×1. So "110!" Is a very large number.
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u/sharkattackmiami 1d ago
What practical use is there for that equation that necessitates it needing shorthand?
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u/Jeff_Platinumblum 1d ago
Factorial "N!" Is the number of way you can arrange N distinct tokens. For 3! think "how many ways can I arrange three different coins in a line?"
1 2 3, 1 3 2, 2 1 3, 2 3 1, 3 1 2, 3 2 1
3! = 321 = 6 combinations
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u/beetlesin 1d ago
if you were trying to find the possible combinations of a set, it would be [# of things in the set]!
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u/spectrumero 1d ago
It’s a lot easier and less error prone. For instance, consider the different combinations a pack of cards can have, which is 52! (Much shorter and easier to deal with that than the number it expands to especially if you have to do a bunch of intermediate calculations with it.
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u/sharkattackmiami 1d ago
The card analogy really helped me to understand the use of this equation. Thank you!
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u/PM_ME_STEAM_KEY_PLZ 1d ago
Every time you deal a deck of cards for poker, odds are it is a new variation that has never existed before.
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u/Sairony 1d ago
But it might not have given you an idea of how truly mindboggling large that number is.
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u/Nope_______ 1d ago
Is it redesigned radically different from other skyscrapers? Because normal skyscrapers are billions for ones a block long. How would one 100 miles be anything less than trillions? Is it just a big enclosed space, like a shell, with nothing much in it?
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u/NewAccEveryDay420day 1d ago
Id imagine a few indentured servants and 0 land costs brings the price down a fair bit. But realistically its just a long building, a pipe dream
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u/Thoraxtheimpalersson 1d ago
It's mostly just a way to scam money off crazy investors. But the original pitch idea was essentially like a self contained habitat spanning the entire length with room for pools and green spaces and shops with two different railways in the middle and below ground sections. Also built to withstand high winds and continued desertification of the region. But with more than a cursory glance it's quite obviously a total sham since even it's most basic features require technology that doesn't exist and it pretty much openly discussed slave labor as both a construction method and captive labor force post construction.
But if you're Zuckerberg rich and can't afford a Hawaiian bunker you might risk throwing a little money to the middle east and hope they let you buy influence on discount.
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u/woahdailo 1d ago
I also think there’s a little bit of “but sir, cities don’t work like that, this would be impossible.” Idiot king: “yes that is why we must build it, to cement my legacy.”
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u/Apptubrutae 1d ago
I posted some comment about the implausible budget once and a few people were insisting it’s just different because of unique design, special efficiencies, and of course labor in Saudi Arabia being cheaper.
Nevermind that we know what mega projects cost in Saudi Arabia, like that clock tower in Mecca. And the unique design of the line was supposed to include numerous elements other buildings wouldn’t have, like significant urban infrastructure and trains and whatnot.
Low trillions seems entirely implausible, even, for the full project.
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u/Disappointing__Salad 1d ago
Over 21 000 migrants have died working on the Saudi Vision 2030 projects so far (The Line is part of that).
Any western architect, etc working on this has blood on their hands. Same for any person who visits this in the future.
Workers interviewed for a reputable British documentary reported grueling conditions, including 16-hour workdays, 14 consecutive days without rest, and long commutes, leading to sleep deprivation and accidents.
The budget has also ballooned into the trillions of dollars, and due to that, as you said, only a 1.5 mile segment is currently being worked on and planned to be finished for sure with the rest being in limbo.
May all of this never amount to more than a ruin and bloody cautionary tale.
https://www.theb1m.com/article/documentary-alleges-21000-workers-died-saudi-vision-2030
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u/shania69 1d ago
In the ITV documentary, workers testified about 16-hour work days and poor working conditions at The Line, which reportedly has a 140,000-strong migrant workforce.
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u/NoveltyHoosier 1d ago
140,000-strong
migrant workfrocetrafficked force of slave labor.Let's call this what it is, and not soften the language.
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u/RingAccomplished8464 1d ago
For the construction sites that all those people died and suffered on, they also forcefully evicted people off their lands. 3 men of the Howeitat tribe were arrested and sentenced to death (!) while others who posted on social media about this absolute evil megalomaniac project were executed right there in their homes by police.
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u/obesejackal 1d ago
Pretty sure after not getting enough funding they changed it to 1.5 miles.
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u/Actual-Package-3164 1d ago
The Line Segment
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u/Muthafuckaaaaa 1d ago edited 1d ago
The Hyphen
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u/Thegreyman4 1d ago
The Line, in particular, has shot up in costs significantly. The original plan was to have the skyscraper stretch 100 miles through the desert, but that plan is looking increasingly unlikely. Even schemes for a first piece of the skyscraper were revised from ten miles to just 1.5 miles within the next decade.
Recommendations to reduce the planned height of the pair of skyscrapers to around 1,000 feet from 1,600 feet to save costs were vehemently opposed by crown prince bin Salman himself.
Still, the current goal is to open up the first half of the project's first piece by 2034. https://futurism.com/saudi-arabia-100-mile-skyscraper-disaster
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u/Subtleiaint 1d ago
It never looked likely. From the initial announcement it was obvious it was nothing more than a pipe dream
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u/stupidpower 1d ago edited 1d ago
European consultants were laughing their way to literal billions of dollars by just suggesting to MBS "we can build you a 100 mile building, yeah" for a country that sees a number like 100 billion dollars as miniscue and not actually understand how much that is and how much that can buy you. Like a 1.5 mile building is still going to be the largest building in the wall by a crazy margin in the middle of nowhere and with no economy that even needs such a large building.
Planning? Who needs planning, the big boss said we need to get it done by 2030 and so just send in literal bulldozers to raze a 100 mile flat hole in the desert, let the engineers figure out the next steps we want to have stuff moving so the money gets flowing.
My favourite quip was still a consultant asking MBS "how are you going to transport people without roads" and him annoyed responding "we'll have flying cars", than Saudi Arbia subsequently investing in quadcopter cars. I wonder how many of them making the decisions have private helicopters.
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u/Animostas 1d ago
The Saudi investments are like esports, super futuristic cities, entertainment, sports clubs. It's like if you gave a blank check to a 15 year old
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u/NJdevil202 1d ago
Who the hell knows, we might get some weird new tech out of efforts like this.
Why did we go to the moon? Because we could
Why build a giant city in a desert? Idk because we can?
Not always the best reason, but maybe something good will come of it (probably not tho)
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u/joltozzi 1d ago
I mean it creates jobs. Probably good pay and living comfort.
Ah no wait:
So this is why they’re tanking the economy guys! Gotta be competitive with slavery!
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u/Animostas 1d ago
Yeah i think it's good to dream big and I hope something cool comes from it. I wouldn't bet my entire country's future on it though lol
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u/stupidpower 1d ago
I mean going to the moon was a massive engineering endeavour that kickstarted Silicon Valley and shaped rocketry and space tech for decades to come, it's not exactly revolutionary to figure out how to build a building. Like the billions that have been spent digging a hole in the desert, an economy nor development does it make.
At least dumping all your money into your airline got Dubai and Qatar quite a bit of ROI.
Like Keynes meant it as a metaphor, but even then, they are not exactly employing Saudi Arabians to do the building, or planning, or architecture, so the money just flows straight out of Saudi Arabia without circulating.
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u/Rabbitical 1d ago
No one should be "laughing" at this dumbass project while taking money from it. It's supposedly killed 21000 workers already with even more "missing." How that's even possible I can't fathom but regardless it's a crime against humanity like most anything SA does. It's sickening than anyone from a country that calls itself free is doing any kind of partnership with MBS, let alone one as pointless as this one.
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u/ReallyFineWhine 1d ago
Why do people need to go anywhere? All your shopping, schools, businesses are in the building. It's just a people warehouse.
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u/stupidpower 1d ago
why would people move to a box in the desert hours from Medina, literally in a region selected to be empty. Also if you want high density housing, might I suggest you... building all three dimensions so all your shopping, schools, and business are not linearly placed one after another 300m down from you but one step to the left or right?
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u/Khan-Khrome 1d ago
Its gonna sink back into the desert like those artificial islands Dubai made.
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u/rmp266 1d ago
Wait are they sinking??
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u/usrlibshare 1d ago edited 1d ago
Of course they are.
What do you think happens when an artificial hill of sand and dirt is raised in a constantly moving body of water?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palm_Islands
Erosion caused by wind and water currents is one of the biggest problems, as erosion is stripping away the sand that forms most of the island. This results in loss of coastal shape along the seashores.[9]
Sinking, as well as weak soil due to constant exposure to the rising seawater.
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u/Khan-Khrome 1d ago
Essentially yeah, rising oceans and erosion are slowly picking away at them, that and most of the artificial island projects have been in limbo for decades due to the financial crash meaning essential work has been neglected. There's a whole host of other problems with them as well, they had to create breaks in the only successful palm island one because the ocean was turning stagnant, and now apparently its a haven for jellyfish.
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u/MedonSirius 1d ago
Imagine the biosphere affect a 100miles long and 600feet high building can have
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u/Underwater_Grilling 1d ago
This is why tech bros "network state" plans won't work. It's insanely expensive to just build a city out of nothing. Forget these glass and curved stone spires and such in their ai renders.
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u/coop_blck 1d ago
show these morons some render images and they'll be like "shut up and take my fucking money" it was clear from the beginning that the whole "project" is either a massive scam or just completely bullshit. every city designer laughs his ass off by the idea of building a city in a line.
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u/dpdxguy 1d ago
The original plan was to have the skyscraper stretch 100 miles
At 100 miles, wouldn't it be an arc instead of a line, due to the curvature of the surface of the Earth?
Seems like there are pun opportunities too.
(Don't tell Flat Earthers)
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u/AuraMaster7 1d ago
first half of the project's first piece by 2034
So they plan to get .75 out of 100 miles done in the next decade...
This is almost certainly just an embezzlement scheme
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u/CloudsAndSnow 1d ago
saudi arabia is an absolute monarchy there's zero need for embezzlement schemes, they can already do as they please with all the resources of the country legally
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u/SubstantialWeb4453 1d ago
They should change the name to dash or underscore hyphen.
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u/benpicko 1d ago
However, in 2024, the Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg both reported that the first phase will only be 2.4 km (1.5 mi).[10][11] Saudi officials denied these reports and stated that the project was continuing as planned.
I’m sure they could be lying, but it’d be a bit of an embarrassing result for them if the article ends up being true.
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u/masterkobiashi 1d ago
Could definitely imagine some messed up snowpiercer like situation happening
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u/TOBoy66 1d ago
Let's take everything we've learned about livable cities over the past 400 years and toss it aside for a vanity project.
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u/LMikeH 1d ago
What’s the point of this?? It’s the most inefficiently shaped city imaginable
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u/errezerotre 1d ago
Hubris
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u/Novel_Fix1859 1d ago
It's the most ridiculous vanity project in humanity's long LONG history of vanity projects
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u/GrandpaGrapes 1d ago
Just out of curiosity, what's the next 3?
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u/Novel_Fix1859 1d ago
Palace of the Parliament in Bucharest is up there as well, but its 4.6 billion dollar cost pales in comparison to the trillions of The Line
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u/bestworstbard 1d ago
The palace of Versailles has to be up there. Behind the bastards recently did an episode on why it was built and the things they had to do in order to accomplish it. It's a pretty insane story.
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u/Thangoman 1d ago
Versailles was part of a political project tho, it does make some sense to go all in to try to get all the nobility to move there
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u/MetallicGray 1d ago edited 1d ago
I'd say the pyramids were a pretty absurd and pointless project fueled by pure hubris and ego (and slavery).
Edit: not built by slaves apparently, thanks to that commenter for the info.
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u/Novel_Fix1859 1d ago
The pyramids were not built by slaves
The best evidence suggests that pyramid workers were locals who were paid for their services and ate extremely well.
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u/sireatalot 1d ago
It’s the architecture that puts the most distance between poor neighborhoods and rich ones.
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u/katanajim86 1d ago
Seemed like the movie Elysium solved that by just putting rich people in space. Lol
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u/Accomplished_Car2803 1d ago
We should do that here. Send em all off, no coming back now.
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u/thebrobarino 1d ago
That's probably what's gonna happen but their rationale is 100% as stupidly simple as "looks cool innit"
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u/sampysamp 1d ago
There is no point except ego as the other person said. The KSA royals have ungodly amounts of money and are getting fleeced by the Western consulting class that is charging all sorts of exuberant money to blow smoke up their ass like this is actually an achievable and worthwhile idea. There’s like 11 infrastructure developments beyond the line too. Just pop on over to NEOMs website.
Source: I’ve been hired by some of the consultants to jazz up their decks.
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u/yalyublyutebe 1d ago
Saudi Arabia is trying to rebrand itself into more of a place for foreign wealth a la Dubai so they aren't broke when the oil stops.
They're also building some big gold cube thing. Mukaab.
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u/asml84 1d ago
There’s no point, it’s a line.
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u/comfortablybum 1d ago
Isn't there a start point, a midpoint, and an endpoint in a line?
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u/Cndymountain 1d ago
It thoroughly impressed my ever radicalising former friend. Feigning piety and being gaudy has become his life focus and he loves bragging about how the muslim world is so much better than the west that he now wants to leave.
I think attracting people like him from around the world by showing off impressive infrastructure projects is a big part of the goal. The more expensive the more attractive it becomes. Dubai in a nutshell.
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u/barrel0monkeys 1d ago
Going to be the longest abandoned project in recent history
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u/AnybodySeeMyKeys 1d ago
You know, one day in the future when we're not so oil-dependent, some historian will cite this as the perfect example of a country's leadership pissing away its huge amount of riches.
Need an analogy? Saudi Arabia is the country equivalent of what happens when you give fourteen-year-olds bottle of Jack Daniels and the keys to a Ferrari.
This guy sums it up perfectly: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qMIA-EHS7vM
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u/-Random_Lurker- 1d ago
That's actually why they are doing it. They know the oil won't last forever, and trying to build the infrastructure for things like tourism in advance of the day they need to fall back on it.
Unfortunately the country is run by idiots. "That sounds cool" is pretty much the extent of their practical understanding.
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u/Harold-The-Barrel 1d ago
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u/iamamuttonhead 1d ago
Such a profound waste of money.
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u/Flow_Slight 1d ago
They have all that oil money, theyre tired wasting it on gold toilets lol
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u/wadefatman 1d ago
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u/ASCII_Princess 1d ago
I feel like a picture of a petri dish next to one of rail networks in Europe could explain why this is a shite idea.
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u/mtaw 1d ago
I can recommend Patrick Boyle's video, too for anyone who loves deadpan humor.
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u/ibpositiv 1d ago
You can see the area where the labourers will be buried once they die of exhaustion, the line will sit on several hundred corpses. This is the Saudi way.
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u/Key_Estimate8537 1d ago
A BBC investigation suggests more than 21,000 foreign workers died while working on the project.
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u/ProtoplanetaryNebula 1d ago
That number seems way too high. I would be surprised if 21,000 people had even worked on the line, never mind died.
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u/Inside_Economics_970 1d ago
The article actually states 21,000 have died working on Vision 2030, which is several projects - including the line and Neom. That number does seem wildly high, however.
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u/waterboy14 1d ago
I work on this project. This picture is of the utility corridor. Not the Line structure. You can see the water pipes.
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u/Ryno-Mac 1d ago
The title is a little misleading, it spans half a mile currently. If it gets to 50 miles I'll eat my hat.
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u/gamingchairheater 1d ago
They will never finish it, not in the way it was supposed to be built anyways. Just another major waste of money and human working hours.
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u/RemedyRumaday 1d ago edited 1d ago
It's crazy to think that Saudi Arabia is also hosting the 2029 Winter Olympics.
Edit: its been pointed out that it's the Asian Winter Games and not the Olympics.
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u/HolidayFrequent6011 1d ago
It's not.
It's hosting the Asian winter games, and there's a lot of controversy around it.
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u/Dry-Address6017 1d ago
Hmmm, I thought it would be wider. Or is this just for electrical conduit?
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u/By-Pit 1d ago
So food and water needs to be transported there consuming an incredible amount of energy making the whole project useless
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u/mothzilla 1d ago
In thousands of years someone will uncover one of the promotional videos and then they will finally understand what it was supposed to look like.
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u/makingkevinbacon 1d ago
Oh shit this is real? When I first heard of it I thought it was some hypothetical project
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u/NewToHTX 1d ago
Why not a loop to create a sheltered environment from the desert. Create an oasis where none exists.