Saudi Reveals Plans For 75-Mile Long Desert Skyscraper Mirror Line

Saudi Arabia plans to build a 75-mile sidescraper that stretches across the desert, bragging that it’ll stand taller than the Empire State Building. The $1 trillion structure would have mirrored glass entirely as the outer wall and house over five million people inside.

The project is dubbed NEOM and is comparable in size to Massachusetts, as announced by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in 2021.

He spoke about the ambitious project in January last year, “The Line is a project that is a civilizational revolution that puts humans first.”

The Prince added that it would be ready by 2030, but engineers have revealed that the sidescraper with two 1600-feet tall buildings might take over 50 years to finish.

The length of NEOM might even need struts as they take the earth’s curvature into consideration.

It extends from the Gulf of Aqaba and cuts through a mountain range before entering the coast to an “aerotropolis.” This linear community, per confidential documents that lay the plan in detail, would allow residents to meet each other within a five-minute walk.

A means of transportation powered by renewable energy will allow people to travel from one end to the other in 20 minutes.

The desert community brags intricate designs as stairwells adorned the wall with vertical farming technology involved in the plans.

Thousands of jobs are set to be available in this community, with all five-million residents expected to pay a “subscription” fee of sorts for three meals a day supplied from local produce. There’s also a sports stadium that’ll be located 1,000 feet above the ground.

The skyscrapers and community will be completely carbon neutral, as Prince Saudi declared. It will be a sustainable, environmentally-friendly place to live in.

Investors, however, have not shown similar confidence in the Crown Prince’s newest declaration since they scraped a previously ambitious plan to build a mile-high skyscraper meant to be the world’s tallest.

The skyscraper project was abandoned after they faced funding difficulties. On top of that, foreigners have not been showing interest as Saudi Arabia continued to face criticisms for lack of transparency and violating human rights. Most notably was the Crown Prince’s denial of involvement in eliminating journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018.

With NEOM, news has also broken that security had allegedly killed a resident after tribes were being forcibly relocated for the project.

Environmentalists have also sounded their concerns over how the huge structure would affect animal migrations, the groundwater, and how the mirror’s reflection might confuse animals, particularly birds.