The Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman he is planning an architectural work that surpasses the Egyptian pyramids in size and resonance.
According to the WSJ, the plans being studied by Salman's architects are mammoth, and would be worth by far the largest structure in the world. It is a very long "line" made up of two parallel skyscrapers and 480 meters high that would extend for 120 kilometers. The name of this complex is Mirror Line, and the intentions of those who are planning it should host about five million people.
The cost? Needless to say, pharaonic. Up to a trillion dollars for what looks like a long golden Eden from the photos, but which could turn out to be a nightmare.
A linear city
The operation, whether or not it is its final form, is part of the Saudi effort to "shake up" a hitherto oil-based economy. I also do not exclude that it may serve to remove the international perception of an illiberal state, which comes to kill (this is the accusation) its political opponents, such as the journalist Jamal Kashoggi.
The fact is that Mirror Line is yet another attempt to create an old ball by Mohammed Bin Salman, that of the "linear city". An urban settlement viable with its own high-speed railway and equipped with a stadium, marina and other mega structures powered, I read, by renewable energy. It is no coincidence that this project looks like a re-edition (downward) of the first project, that of Neom, a 170-kilometer linear city (we told you about it here, January 2021).
It would be madness, prince
The Saudi prince's dreams of glory seem to translate into a catastrophic reality if this hypothesis begins to be evaluated. How would the management of a pandemic take place in this "trap" of parallel buildings? What about a possible supply chain problem?
Not to mention the migratory routes of birds and even aquifers: the damage (even unintentional) of a similar structure could be gigantic.
Are we counting on the Saudi prince's sensitivity to these issues? The question has something of rhetoric, and we add nothing else out of understandable fear.
