Saudi Arabia’s Line City Explained

The Line is ridiculous, but it could still be built.

Narrator - Fred Mills
Producer - Tim Gibson
Video Editing - Jim Casey
Executive Producers - Fred Mills, James Durkin and Jaden Urbi

Additional footage and images courtesy of NEOM, Rodrigo de Almeida Marfan, Rodolfo Stuckert, Toyota, CSCEC EGYPT and City of Telosa.

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[timbruns]

Geometrically, a line is among the least efficient, and therefore least sustainable forms of organizing a city. Just think a second: If you want everything in 5 minutes distance along a 170 km line that is also 500 m tall - you need endless elevator shafts and multiple highspeed and lowspeed trainlines stuffed in there constantly servicing the structure. This will consume a multiple of energy, resources and, actually, space, to have the same comfort and amenities of a concentric shaped city. There is a reason almost all cities are concentric, and it's not a lack of imagination. It's just much more efficient - and therefore also sustainable. So can we please stop uncritically repeating these claims about sustainability which is a mere marketing buzzword.

[aronc]

Can someone please explain to me how a giant mirror wall in the desert isn’t a huge eco safety hazard?

[Samuel_J]

Saudipunk 2077

Looks great as a game concept, but as reality? It's a complete disaster.

[dgpuped]

Another concern could be disaster response or evacuation. Most urban areas people can retreat in many directions but with a linear city, depending on planning, crowds may be funneled. Especially, on higher levels. Bottlenecks and crowds can turn into a nightmare. Emergency crews may also be restricted by the layout.

There are stories of shipwrecks where passengers encounter bottlenecks while trying to get out. People die.

[skyscraperfan]

Just make a simple calculation: How much will the city cost per cubic metre? The budget of $500 billion might sound impressive, but there are 17 billion cubic metres of space between the reflective facades. That's less than $30 per cubic metre. Is there ANY building that costs only $30 per cubic metre? That does not even work for large empty halls. $30 per cubic metre is not even enough for a simple wooden hut in your garden.

The glass facade alone is 170 million square metres large. You know better than I how much a modern glass facade costs, if it has to be strong enough to withstand the huge wind pressure. $1, 000 per square metre would already be very cheap and even those $1, 000 would add up to $170 billion just for the facade.

The Line would also need a lot of train tunnels to move millions of people wherever they want. The 20 minutes maximum travel time are unrealistic, as the high speed train can stop every five kilometres or so. There have to be a limited number of stops of the high speed train, from there you move to a slower train an finally to a very local train that stops every 500 metres or so. In total most travel times would be between one or two hours except for people whose start and destination are both close to high speed stops. But even high speed trains need some time to reach their highest speed and time to get from high speed to zero. And that in each stop.

The best idea about The Line I read so far: Just build it in the Metaverse!

[darrenchin_]

concept artists making an absolute killing these last few years

[r.coleman]

Kowloon Walled City 2: Arabian Bogaloo

[dominnno]

in the future when the line gets finished:
“Mom, what’s outside the walls?”
“Monsters, titans.”

[LarperCletus]

One of the biggest long-term issues I see is The Line’s inability to evolve. People see it as the next step in the revolution of city design. But what happens 50 or 100 years after it is built, when linear cities may be considered obsolete? Most current cities can (albeit, difficulty and slowly) change to suit their residents’ needs. The line would always be a massive, long structure in the middle of the desert.

And RIP to anyone who tries to build just outside and underneath the massive mirror.

[samueltotheoh]

Imagine how dystopian this could be. The entire World burns and you're trapped in "The Line", set curfews and police guards walking everywhere. It's like snowpiercer in the desert but at a much larger scale.

[Justyburger]

I would turn the line into a giant donut shape, so you don't need to go end to end. You can just go around in a circle. You could also create a giant green space in the middle. Lots of forests and parks. That would be way better.

[trevorhenriques]

The guy at 2:12 said it EXACTLY !
It is not a matter of whether you can build this, or how. It is “WHY” ???

In other words, “Here is the solution”.
“Now please identify what problem or problems it is designed to solve” ?

[nninjastrike]

The Line is in a desert where there is lots of empty space, so why artificially limit yourself by only building in practically one dimension?
Also what happens if a train breaks down or a section of rail needs maintenance, all of a sudden you need to shut down an entire section of the network as it is one dimensional.
Another thing is that The Line seems extremely expensive to maintain, so once Saudia Arabia starts losing oil money they will need to abandon it, which will turn the Line from an expensive vanity project into a slum (assuming it isn't abandoned beforehand).

[hijikatasan]

honestly the best design to squash demonstrations and uprisings

[charlesrovira]

This will make truly _incredible _*_ruins._*
A hundred-and-seventy kilometer *mirrored **_slash_* across the sere landscape of the arid desert will be so much more impressive than just a mere pair of feet like *Ozimandias.*
This will speak of decay on a truly epic scale.

[C.A.D.D]

“We thought this project would be a failure, we thought it would be a waste. But ever since the shattering, the line has served as the last refuge for humanity. It’s far from paradise, but compared to what’s out there, this is Eden”

[ImissVine]

I can feel the dystopian writers gripping their pens and keyboards with inspiration.

[EVILBUNNY]

At first the line seemed pretty unrealistic, but still doable. Then when version 2 was unveiled I knew it was just never gonna be built. Definitely a case of I’ll believe it when I see it (built)

[ShadowRaptor]

It's basically gonna be a dystopian Snowpiercer train except not moving and in the desert.

[russellmanweller]

It's a great PR tool, and gives us a way to have a model that we can discuss ideas around. A line is the most direct route from a to b. So we find out what people like about the way it is organized, and then we can market those aspects, but the line can be cut up into sections that can be rearranged. It won't be one big line, but rather lots of smaller lines that handle different types of infrastructure. You can have a powder section, separate from a food production section, or a living section, but each section is a line, so whatever each section provides, can have the most direct route to bring services and products to the people who need them. Starting out as one big line is just an easy way to start to visualize it, before it's broken up into separate buildings.