The core "The Line" of the project was originally planned to accommodate 1.5 million residents by 2030, but it has been adjusted to accommodate less than 300000 people. "The Line" is designed to cover about 170 km of desert area, but the current plan is only expected to complete 2.4 Kilometers The construction of the project was significantly reduced to 1.4% of the original plan.
(Screenshot of Bloomberg website)
In July 2022, the Saudi Arabian government released the visual effect map of a 170 km long linear city (The line) in a very high profile, shocking the world.
This is a futuristic urban concept that subverts the imagination, hoping to create a landmark and eternal architectural miracle like the Egyptian pyramid. A city 170 kilometers long, only 200 meters wide, has no cars, It is the world's first "zero gravity vertical city" and the world's largest "zero carbon emission city" 。
The CEO of NEOM said: "At NEOM, we have gathered a group of the smartest people who are committed to re imagining the sustainable development future 20 to 30 years later and building it today to meet some of the most pressing challenges facing mankind. We are redefining the future."
The Line Effect Picture (source: NEOM)
In the original plan, The Line is expected to welcome the first batch of residents in 2024, but the financial pressure and practical challenges led to the reduction of the project.
It is reported that the cash reserve of the Saudi sovereign wealth fund (PIF) fell to $15 billion in September 2023, the lowest level since 2020.
The Line project construction site (source: NEOM)
The reduction of this super project makes people have to lament that Saudi Arabia will also run out of money. There will also be uncompleted projects.
These money burning "super buildings" and "super cities" explore the limits of building structures and the boundaries of human imagination, representing the ambitions of a country or city.
What will be the fate of these money burning projects?
01
Can the future cities that spend trillions of dollars can live up to reality?
The line concept, It is to build a city that can accommodate 9 million people to live and live within the high wall of two ultra long mirrors, with a total investment of 500 billion dollars.
The line is only one of the projects of NEOM with an investment of trillions of dollars. The overall NEOM project is expected to be initially completed in 2040.
The Line Effect Picture (source: NEOM)
The Line Effect Picture (source: NEOM)
NEOM also includes many plans.
Designed by Danish architecture firm BIG OXAGON Project Located on the coast of the Red Sea in the northwest of Saudi Arabia, it is an octagonal floating port city and will become a "The world's largest floating structure" 。
OXAGON effect picture (source: NEOM)
Trojena The mountainous area in Tabuk, Saudi Arabia, is planned as a Ski and adventure resort It will include an interactive nature reserve, a series of residences, such as apartments, wooden houses, luxury houses and hotels, and a skyscraper with a height of 330 meters designed by Zaha Hadid.
Trojena effect picture (source: NEOM)
Immersive activity space Utamo , aims to create an innovative activity space to attract global artists and participants.
Utamo effect picture (source: NEOM)
Although the "The Line" project has shrunk, Saudi Arabia continues to promote other parts of the NEOM project, such as Luxury tourist destination in Sindalah It is expected that the first batch of guests will be welcomed in 2024. This 840000 square meter island is a major portal of the Red Sea, and will be developed into a resort for yacht communities, which is defined as "the future of luxury travel".
Renderings of Sindalah, Luxury Island (source: NEOM)
In addition, NEOM has also successfully promoted the construction of solar and wind power plants worth more than 8 billion dollars, which indicates that Saudi Arabia hopes to become one of the world's largest green fuel producers to reduce its dependence on oil sales.
The challenges faced by NEOM project have come one after another. In the project impact assessment at the beginning of 2021, experts pointed out that the architect must construct the project in stages, which will take about 50 years. The huge structure of the new building may change the flow of groundwater in the dry valley in the desert, and the activities of millions of local birds and other animals may be affected
I don't know how much of this ambitious vision can be achieved in the future?
02
Palm Island of Dubai, the "eighth wonder of the world" with rotten tail
Dubai It can be said that it is a testing ground for magic buildings, and the big projects that cost money have kicked off here.
Dubai came up with the idea of reclaiming land from the sea. It built islands of different shapes in the Persian Gulf with sand and stone, and wanted to attract tourists as landmarks. At the same time, it built luxury hotels, villas and entertainment facilities on these islands, either for tourists to enjoy themselves or to attract foreign investment.
Dubai (source: unsplash)
In 2001, Nakheel started the Palm Jumeirah Reclamation project. After about six years of hard work, Jumeirah Palm Island was finally completed in 2007 after burning 12 billion US dollars. Its length and width were about 5 kilometers, and it was later known as the "eighth wonder of the world".
Jumeirah Palm Island has 17 "leaves", each of which has 1500 seaside luxury houses, and there are 6000 apartments on the "tree trunk" of Jumeirah Palm Island.
Palm Jumeirah (source: DigitalGlobe)
Dubai's major construction plan suffered setbacks only one year after the completion of Jumeirah Palm Island. The Palm Island of Dubai is not only one of today's Jumeirah Palm Islands, but consists of four islands, namely, Jumeirah Palm Island, Ali Mountain Palm Island, Della Palm Island and World Island.
The other three islands were all shut down due to the financial crisis that swept the world in 2008, almost becoming the world's largest uncompleted projects.
Dubai artificial island (photo source: unsplash)
After all, the artificial island built by reclamation is "against the trend". The construction of Jumeirah Palm Island has affected the natural flow of wind, causing the sediment on the surrounding seabed to move 40 kilometers in five years, burying the seabed oysters Of Habitat and destruction of the seabed 1 km2 According to the monitoring data of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration of the United States, the Jumeirah Palm Island is also sinking at the rate of 5mm every year.
03
The "net red ball" that cost 16.6 billion yuan lost 700 million yuan in one month element
"MSG Sphere" is a huge spherical building Madison Square Garden Entertainment Co., Ltd. spent 2.3 billion dollars (about 16.6 billion yuan) and took six years to build, which is located in the "gambling city" of Las Vegas.
It is 112 meters high, equivalent to 31 floors high, with the widest part reaching 157 meters.
This futuristic large-scale construction project uses a total of 31351 square meters of fixed aluminum profiles and 2647 square meters of pre perforated aluminum profiles. The building shell is the largest LED screen in the world, with pixels up to 268.43 million. People can enjoy a realistic VR experience without wearing glasses.
The sphere can change all kinds of shapes 24 hours without interruption, which makes the onlookers sigh that the scenes in the science fiction movies have come true.
MSG Sphere (source: MSG Sphere official website)
From the rock concert of U2 band to the F1 event in Canada, the "MSG Sphere" makes the audience immerse in different wonderful scenes as if through time and space.
U2 concert site (source: MSG Sphere official website)
It is such a miraculous building, but it has just been built and announced financial emergency.
According to the report, due to the high construction and operating costs of the Spherical Building itself, as well as the cost of maintaining the huge LED screen, "MSG Sphere" suffered losses of about 700 million yuan ($98.4 million) in three months of operation. The CFO also resigned due to internal disagreement.
MSG Sphere has also caused dissatisfaction among local residents, who believe that its strong light has affected their night rest, and that "Internet celebrity buildings" will only increase the surrounding housing prices, rather than directly building more residential houses.
Whether we really need such a super popular landmark still needs to be considered.
04
The $25 billion landmark is deeply involved in the "suicide doubt"
In the fourth quarter of World of the West, the prototype of the game world that Charlotte Hale weaves is the "crazy city" New York. In this world, the daily commute routes of women owners include apartment 528, West Street 28, designed by Zaha Hadid, and The Shed Art Center designed by Diller Scofidio+Renfro. They are all from Hudson Square, New York 。
The Hudson Plaza project announced an investment of 25 billion dollars, which was praised by Fortune magazine as "The largest real estate development project in American history" , expected to be completed in 2026.
Western World, the fourth season stills (source: Douban)
(The cover of Fortune magazine)
It is full of "buildings piled up with money", which are built by the world's top firms, such as SOM、KPF、Foster、Heatherwick ... It is simply an architectural exposition in the new century.
Building 50, Hudson Square (source: Foster+Partners, photographer: Nigel Young)
Building 10 and 30, Hudson Square (source: KPF, photography: KPF+Connie Zhou)
In Hudson Square, the most striking one is The Vessel, an observation tower designed by Thomas Heatherwick 。
The Vessel is a honeycombed "big step" consisting of 154 stairs and 80 viewing platforms. The height of the building is nearly 50 meters, overlapping and interweaving, and the scene is colorful. You can overlook the Hudson River and Manhattan not far away.
The Vessel (source: Archdaily, photographer: Michael Mora)
However, this building has caused great controversy. Since 2019, three people have chosen to jump off the building to end their lives. The Vessel can only announce its closure, and will not reopen until May 2021, and will no longer accept visitors for personal trips.
The Vessel (source: Archdaily, photographer: Siying Alice Han)
Some people think that this behemoth reflects various problems of the gap between the rich and the poor in the United States, and the separation of elites from reality. This space without clear functions has become a typical example of the failure of the chaebol to build public space.
05
What will happen to Hainan Danzhou Haihua Island with an investment of 160 billion yuan after Evergrande thunderstorm?
Evergrande's first cultural and tourism project Haihua Island, Danzhou, Hainan With a total investment of 160 billion yuan, this complex has always been at the center of the storm.
In the 2021 "Top Ten Ugly Buildings in China", the Haihua Island Building Group ranked first and was rated as "The capital is capricious, destroys the marine ecology, and its shape is strange and disorderly" 。
Over the years, the buildings on Haihua Island have been "illegal construction - shutdown - fine" - Continue to violate the construction ”In the end, the reconsideration organ made a decision to change the original demolition to confiscation according to law.
Hainan Danzhou Hengda Haihua Island Building Complex (source: Architecture Talk Network)
Haihua Island, known as the "largest artificial island in the world", is composed of three independent offshore islands, with a planned reclamation area of about 8 square kilometers. Seen from the sky, it looks like three flowers blooming in the sea.
According to the plan, there are 28 types of business here, including international conference and exhibition center, museum cluster, fairy tale world, water park, ocean world, international shopping center, modern hotel cluster, five country hot spring city, and Huaxia film and television base. However, it seems that buildings of different regions and styles are pieced together, like a dance of demons.
Hainan Danzhou Hengda Haihua Island Building Complex (source: Architecture Talk Network)
The Haihua Island project was launched in 2009, when Hainan's reclamation project was in the era of the "Great Leap Forward". A total of 12 artificial islands were filled out, and Haihua Island was the largest among many islands.
This artificial island is located in the bay area between Paipu Port and Yangpu Port, only 600 meters away from the coast, which directly led to the permanent destruction of large areas of coral reefs and white butterfly shells. Such cultural and tourism projects have caused serious damage to the local ecology, both in terms of landscape vision and ecological environment.
Hainan Danzhou Hengda Haihua Island Building Complex (source: Architecture Talk Network)
After 13 years from its inception to operation, Haihua Island has gone from being the focus of attention to internal and external troubles. It shows the ambition of a real estate group to enter the cultural and tourism industry, and also exposes the common problems of the development model of cultural and tourism real estate.
On the other hand, this building complex has cost a lot of manpower and material resources to build after all. The damage to the sea has already been caused. Even if it is demolished, it will not help. Confiscation and confiscation may be its best outcome.
epilogue
These money burning projects are expected to drive the economic development of the region and become a model for the future.
The unfinished super buildings are like "warning tablets" reminding architects and developers.
Architecture should still be people-oriented, respect nature, start from reality, and spend every penny on cutting edge, so that architecture can stimulate local potential and make local residents benefit for a long time.
