120km-long mirror-clad skyscraper will house 5 million people in desert
A 120km-long desert skyscraper clad in mirrors will have its own high-speed railway, a sports stadium and vertical gardens where vegetables are harvested by robots.
Leaked architectural designs claim that Mirror Line, an entire city of 5 million people built on stilts as high as the Empire State Building, will be the largest structure in the world and have to ‘‘bend’’ to the curvature of the Earth.
But the building – developed at the whim of Saudi Arabia’s powerful crown prince – may not see the light of day. Mohammed bin Salman’s futuristic Neom megacity being built on the Red Sea coast has been beset by hitches as officials scramble to keep up with his wildly ambitious visions.
The Mirror Line is mooted to cost about US$1 trillion (NZ$1.6 trillion) and has no set completion date, but experts think it would most likely take as long as 50 years. The kingdom is vastly rich and is currently enjoying a massive windfall revenue from high oil prices.
Not all of Saudi Arabia’s dream construction projects are completed. The planned world’s tallest skyscraper was put on hold after the last oil boom petered out.
The Mirror Line is just one part of the wider Neom development that the crown prince, 35, known as MBS, hopes will attract foreign investment into the kingdom to diversify its economy away from oil.
The young prince, who has access to a US$620 billion sovereign wealth fund, is reported to have ever-changing ideas for his master plan and has churned through dozens of key staff members who complain of toxic work environments and mass overspending with few results.
Twenty-five current and former employees told Bloomberg they struggle to implement near-impossible plans for Neom, which is already five years into development. Workers claim there is a culture of fear in telling MBS – who has locked up many of his own family – that some elements of his vision are not possible.
Dozens have reportedly quit while millions of dollars are spent on architects, futurists and Hollywood production designers, according to Bloomberg.
The Saudi government did not respond to the workers’ claims.
In addition to the Neom plans, two mirrored buildings that form the Mirror Line are supposed to run parallel to each other for 120km and stand 490m tall, housing up to 5 million people and costing an estimated US$1 trillion.
Vertical farming will be integrated into the buildings so that residents – who will pay a subscription fee to have three meals a day – will have their vegetables ‘‘autonomously harvested and bundled’’ and taken into their ‘‘coliving kitchens’’, The Wall Street Journal reported.
A sports stadium will sit 300m above the ground and a high-speed train will pass underneath the buildings.