Why Egypt Is Building a New Capital City

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Egypt is building a new capital city right in the middle of the desert. But why are they doing this and why would they choose this unfavorable landscape outside of Cairo in the sahara desert for the project?

Select video clips courtesy of Getty Images
Map source by MapTiler / OpenStreetMap Contributors via Geolayers 3

Thanks to Doug Barnard for allowing me to use his footage.
Check out his video on this topic:

[MsEclectic]

I hope the new city is pedestrian friendly. New cities have the chance to move away from relying heavily on cars hence reducing traffic, noise and pollution. Just hope they grab that chance. I’ve visited Dubai on many occasions and you can’t get from one neighbourhood to another without hitting a motorway. It would be great to see more thought, innovation and flair put into designing this new city.

[patrickgaribay]

My only question is how is this gonna solve the water shortage? Making a city with an artificial river in the desert certainly won’t help🤔

[Sayitlikitiz]

I'm glad that they're building the new cities in the desert. I remember when my family and I stayed in Egypt and visited Alexandria, an Austrian architect told my dad he was sick and tired of having to call the Ministry of Antiquities every time they dug a hole for construction because they keep finding historical artifacts that needed to be cleared! 😂😂😂 We saw Ptolemaic coins they found. Very cool! Only in Egypt!

[micesserono]

To summarize :
1. They have too much traffic but instead of developing public transportation they build more roads and a new city centre.
2. They have a systemic water shortage and will solve it by building a city in the desert.
Great plans, good luck Egypt!

[amirtarek]

You should have added that the new city is going to be between to Suez canal and Cairo. Also, the new capital city will be linked with the metro, monorail, and a High-speed railway.

[hilal_younus]

I hope Egypt makes sure, public transportation is a thing and doesn’t ignore it, traffic *cannot* be solved by building more streets. Even if some people thinks otherwise

[doug_barnard]

I was literally wondering when this video would come out just a few hours ago and then boom, here it is! Loved it, turned out great!!!

[heatherjones]

Spent 4 days in Cairo in November 2018. Uninhabited apartment block buildings everywhere, most without glass in the windows. It was explained to me that purchasers/lessees were expected to buy the glass and appliances, etc. themselves. As far as I could see, then, many buildings had barely 50% occupancy. I don't, therefore, see the whole "housing shortage" issue. It looks like corrupt builders have been able to secure permissions with no oversight or reference to any kind of zoning or other planning regs. and have built willy-nilly all over the city. The massive grinding poverty in which the vast majority of the population lives makes such spaces unattainable and the shoddy construction means the middle classes don't want them. So much easier for elites to head out to the desert, build their own utopia, and let Cairo go to the starving dogs, cats, donkeys, people, and oblivious tourists. Nothing on the images you provide shows where the slaves on whose backs most of this will run are to live. Also, who is paying for all this? Has Egypt become progressive and gone for a tax the rich self-financing scheme or are the poor and middles classes shouldering a deeply unfair tax burden while the corrupt government goes heavily in debt to "whom"???? Reminds me of Greece just after joining the EU/euro. The generals and their cronies made out like bandits on all the loans and now ordinary Greeks have been suffering for 12 years and will keep on suffering for another decade at least. The average citizen of Cairo or rural Egypt will never see inside any of those facilities or benefit in the least from "the tallest building in Africa".

[axelschultz]

Seems like they are building this new city to be very car dependent. If that is the case it might even worsen the traffic situation in old Cairo as well.

[yassern]

After reading a lot comments talking about public transportation, I can tell you as an architect involved with the construction of several parts of the new capital, I've come in contact with a lot of ambitious public transportation projects being built already. To name a few; Transportation Hub, Mono Rail, LRT, Electric Bus network, and the High Speed train. I'm not an expert on this manner, but I can tell you that the planners did put a lot of work in solving these problems before they occur.
The Mono rail for example will link horizontally from East (Red Sea city called Ein Sokna) to West of Cairo (Industrial district of 6th October city) thus reducing a trip that usually takes more than two hours to less than an hour.
The LRT will link diagonally the different urban cities around Cairo.
I believe that the creator can make a whole video talking about the new transportation infrastructure being built.

[IanVanTheemsche]

Loved seeing the storytelling on this one. Making it a 15 minute long story with only voice over and maps must have been hard. Very informative, enjoyed it alot.

[Alext]

Wish all the best to our ancient brothers, much love from Greece! 🇬🇷❤️🇪🇬

[RUmlas]

Love seeing these mega/legacy projects. Years later you see how these projects, initiatives have come together and whether they stayed true to original plans or not and whether they were sort on budget/encountered financial turmoil. Loved this video.

[elliotttheneko]

Two of my concerns:

1) Water? How will it get it?
2) Public Transport? Considering the amount of congestion that initiated this thing in the whole place, what public transport systems will be implemented?

edit:
I've read all of your comments.
From what I've gathered:
- Water should not be as big of an issue human consumption wise, as supposedly it is only an issue in the Agriculture sector.
- As for Public Transport, I can see that there are plans to expand the metro and bus systems (very cool), a High-speed railway to link the major cities (also very cool), and build an LRT and monorail system in New Cairo. Implementing monorail would be rather challenging as not many transport systems use it, so sticking to just LRT would probably be a safer choice, but better than nothing I suppose.
- There are arguments on the grounds that Egypt's military is sucking Egyptian coffers dry. Due to my political beliefs, I do agree to some extent with this statement, but ultimately it is the choice of the Egyptian and only the Egyptian people to decide what they want in a Government, and if they demand a strong military, then so be it.

TL;DR Egypt is making good strides towards their vision of the Cairo Metro (and surrounding cities), but things can most certainly be made even better.

[caiawlodarski]

I love these sorts of modern takes of ancient architecture, the buildings look pharaonic and modern at the same time, it is amazing.

[adhamhamed]

As an Egyptian it really hurts to see that Cairo will no longer be Egypt’s capital
Yeah i get it they made it to stop the traffic madness in Cairo but Cairo is VERY old that it’s actually older than some countries and it contains a lot of history every cm if you really want to end the “traffic madness “ then renovate the other cities in Egypt if u looked at us you will find the most of the Egyptians only live Alexandria and Cairo ( i said most ) so why not put some attention to the other cities and put people to work there instead of them traveling here to find a job

[louisjones]

I was in Egypt in October and let me tell ya, they are building at a pace i never thought possible. New vs Old Cairo are going to be night and day.

[azvdcrafts]

This reminds me what happened here in Brazil during the 1950s With president Kubitschek. The dude decided to relocate the nation's capital (it was Rio at the time) to a more strategic location. Problem was that instead of picking a city like São Paulo or Belo Horizonte, the dude decide to create a new city from scratch (Brasília, our current capital) the amount of money that was lost at this project was so great that in the end the creation of Brasília brought more dispair than actual prosperity 😬

[SekuruJohan]

I appreciate the efforts to reference their history and Egyptian identity in their architecture and city planning. That is an apportunity that was squandered by cities like Dubai.

[jerecosawariya]

Hey bro...
I have only two simple questions...
1. From where will the new capital get the water in future coz Egypt is going through a water crisis....

2. How will they complete this Ultra Mega project coz the financial condition of Egypt is not good on international level....


From my POV instead of making a new city by copying Dubai, Paris and Random US city... They should have to focus on how to develop the real Ciaro....

These are just my points...