>Saudi Arabia has been forced to scale back its $1.5trillion plans for a 106-mile linear desert megacity, according to reports, in a humiliating climb down for the kingdom.>The Line - part of the country's audacious and futuristic NEOM project - was meant to be home to around 1.5 million residents by the end of the decade, with plans to ultimately increase its full capacity to nine million people.>Now, according to people familiar with the project, the development will only stretch 1.5 miles and house fewer than 300,000 residents by 2030, according to a new report from Bloomberg citing sources close to the project and documents.Lol it didn't take long to happen exactly what /n/ said would happen.
Great, now every cagie will be using this as a counter for how walkable cities cost too much and e-bike losers will try to justify their explodium machines with this. I can almost see this being a real talking point for the upcoming elections this fall here in the US and walkable cities like my own place in Boise are pushed back from adding additional bike lanes or heated bike paths to combat snowfall.Just fucking let me move to the netherlands already work...
>>1990781>oh no, why did I move to the most boring country in western europe at the advice of a breadtuber?! What a fool I have been
>>1990783NL has hundreds of years of culture, history, and freely bikable cities compared to the US. I want to move there but I am stuck here because of work.
>>1990784>but I am stuck here because of workNo you're not.You're "stuck" because you don't want to lift a finger to change your situation. Thus, in your mind, it's perfectly reasonable that everyone else should prioritize """walkability""" for you, instead of you doing the work to find a job that allows you to move abroad.
>>1990781nothing walkable about a 106 mile long "city"
Linear cities have always been a stupid idea
>>1990781>Great, now every cagie will be using this as a counter for how walkable cities cost too much> I can almost see this being a real talking point for the upcoming elections this fall here in the USBait or truly mindbroken. Who knows.>heated bike pathsDutch plans for this, and the only results I could find, was cancelled because too expensive. (And too retarded). Another experiment couldn't handle the cold and broke down and resulted in a ruined road surface.Solar cyclesways are also a failure, as was expected by anyone that didn't have the ability to burn endless taxpayer money for their own gains.
>>1990784I lived there and let me tell you its fucking trash lmao, literally nothing to do, rains 24/7, and everything is expensive as shit
>urbanists making fools of themselves againTheir infinite appetite for self-humiliation is actually impressive
>>1990776Adam Something is furiously masturbating after reading the news.
>>1990884I don't blame him for one second. The number of knuckle-dragging retard who believed this was staggering.
So it's basically a big apartment building after this point. Good.
>>1990776Why do Gulf Arabs have the most tasteless and childish ideas on the planet? Their ideas for diversification of oil sound like the business plans I would make as a kid. >Qatar: Build a dozen soccer stadiums and bribe to get a FIFA world cup. That should bring in tourism! >UAE: Flashy cars, insane wealth, building private islands that keep sinking back into the sea, and servants everywhere. That should bring in people and investment! >Saudi Arabia: Lets build a 106 mile single line city in the middle of nowhere. Why not just buy up the solar panels the Chinese keep dumping in the west, put them all around the desert, and run massive data centres with tax incentives and grants? Why not just spend all your oil money on desalination and vertical farming so your people are self reliant? Nope, instead we get the dumbest projects known to man.
>>1990926Because there's no system over there by which people can tell someone with money "lol you're a moron" like there is in america. You talk back, you get beheadedBut don't worry we're making it so that the peons aren't allowed to criticize, the thiels and musks of the world are ensuring that the only media channels left are the ones that kowtow to the narcissistic whimsies of billionaires, so you can relax, we'll be like the gulf arabs soon enough.
>>1990926It’s because Islamic culture is fucking tasteless and has absolutely no sense of artistry.
>>1990926Dubai is like Las Vegas without the gambling or charm. Tacky and relies on slave labor.
>>1990940Your views of both vegas and dubai are out of date
>>1990781>>1990784The day that the Dutch have finally had enough and decide to deport all the fatalistic, do-nothing losers that have invaded their country is going to be hilarious.Fix your own shithole, faggot.
>>1990930>the thiels and musks of the worldI know nothing about Peter Thiel except his name, but Twitter was little more than an instrument of government censorship before Musk bought it. Twitter actively censored the Hunter Biden laptop, the fiery but peaceful protests, and everything about covid and the vaxx that didn't fit the narrative. If anything, Elon is the spearhead of pushback against the modern nobility.
>>1991008>I know nothingyeah that much is clear
>>1990977Dubai only exists as a tax haven for Russian oligarchs and 3rd world businessmen. It's just a glorified Champs-Élysées shopping mall for people who are on the sanctions list. If anything, Dubai has become more wretched over the years, the class divide of servants/rich is nearly feudalistic. That makes sense since it's actually a kingdom with no rights.
>>1991051"I don't approve of it" doesn't mean "it isn't a culture"
>>1991055A symptom of global decay is hardly what you call a culture, unless you consider shitting on models chests as cultural enrichment.
>>1991954If shitting on model's chests is a defining feature of a place's recreational priorities then yes, actually it is a culture. Again, culture doesn't just mean "stuff I like". In fact, very often, it will be a lot of things you find disagreeable. Read a book some time
>>1990776kek it's going to scale back to being just a building in the middle of the desert at some point.why the fuck couldn't MBS just turn Jeddah into Tokyo 2.0. I guess the Emperor has no clothes in Saudi Arabia
>>1990935?>>1990926it's a country ran by braindead yes-men.
>>1990926>Why not just spend all your oil money on desalination and vertical farming so your people are self reliant?Funny that you say that.Ironically, Saudi Arabia used to be self reliant, in fact, the largest diary of the world used to be in Saudi Arabia (too lazy to look up the link, so, trust me, bro!) and they were self reliant on grains and maybe alfalfa and stuff, because they have (well… had) huge, prehistoric aquifers under the desert so they not only drilled for oil but also for water and went farming.But of course, being retarded, they overexploited the aquifer (Which is not reneable) and now they don't farm that much anymore.So that leaves desalination.Yes, with loads of "free" solar, that could work. But they already do a lot of desalination (probably not solar powered though…) but a few years ago I was at a conference and some dude was talkingaout how the red sea already is getting notabley more saline because of this, so if they scale that up even more, they'll fuck up their sea too.What was my point? Forgot. I'm drunk and I'm watching a documaentary about submarines.lol, arabs.
>>1990781Your average amerifat constituent can't even find Saudi Arabia on a map, let alone gives a shit about their petrodollar-funded pipe dreams.
>>1990776but looks they cleaned the sand half of that distance
Why don’t they just build an actual decent city
>>1994440Yup. Now they say there's no scale back.
>>1990776>scale backthat's funnyyou mean "abandon"
>>1990862NL has a lots of recreational culural offerings such as theater plays, events, festivals, concerts, cinemas, night life, museums, hot girls, drugs, bicycle scene ... Travelled there many times>none of that interests meThose staying at home not doing anything while rambling online that theres nothing to do always shine with a special flavour of brain retardation
>>1990926Kek saudis where literally 80IQ goatfuckers 40 years ago. Of course the most important thing for those idiots are golden lambos.Its the same with niggers in the states, give them a bit of money and they turn into those weird flashy subhumans that transplant diamonds in their head like those weird rappers
>>1994444Same reason they keep building giant towers in the middle of nowhere. The people deciding what gets funded are oil barons who want to see who can build the biggest dick.
>>1991997Jeddah even has it's own weeb anime district now too. It's a long road to transition from a pariah state to a fully modernized international hub that people actually want to live, work, and possibly raise a family in. Jeddah specifically couldn't be anything like Tokyo without major changes to the cultural structure. Japan has it's own problems but there's enough to balance out the bullshit it's attractive for expats. Meanwhile in Jeddah the cost of living is relatively high, shops and restaurants close for 20min 5 times a day every day, no alcohol, car dependency, you're certainly not going to be dating anyone there, etc. With NEOM it's not just the Line, it's a collection of some absolutely ridiculous projects as part of a massive international zone far away from the interior and cultural bullshit and close to Jordon, Israel, and Egypt. They want to be everything to everyone so long as they're wealthy, that's why the scale is so ridiculous. The Gulf of Aqaba plan contains 11 different districts: private beach clubs, luxury hotels and residences for the super wealthy, a nature reserve, an outlandish outdoor immersive theater, and so on. My personal favorite is Aquellum a "subterranean digitalized community of the future".As others have mentioned between governmental structure and the directives to build the unprecedented and transformative "no" is not in the vocabulary. Especially for all the engineers, planners, architects, and corpo partners being well compensated to lay and promote the plans as technically feasible. The Line is supposed to be the ultimate expression of mastered planned urbanism and a scifi "Revolution in Civilization". Walt Disney's EPCOT is quaint compared to any one of these projects. Assuming these reports are accurate, The Line scale back is what happens when reality comes up quick, and the people in charge have to revaluate their grand ideas and compromise. Forget Tokyo, MBS wants to outclass every metro area on the planet
>>1990776>we will build a city, the best in the world>we will build a nice mixed-used development, as a project to prospect investors actually>we will build some condos, people might like it I think you know I really hate these sand people with infinite money glitch. They, unlike some african-american that bought a social media, can truly solve most of world issues. But they simply choose not to.You cannot build a city. Cities don't just spawn outta nowhere. Especially when you have zero cuture.Come on, don't tell me saudi arabia has a thriving culture.
>>1995274How much did MBS pay you? Just joking, nice post with a lil bit of their pov and some interesting aspects
>>1995625>You cannot build a city. >Cities don't just spawn outta nowhere.If you can’t build it, and it doesn’t spawn from nowhere, where the fuck do they come from?
If they actually wanted to build something environmentally-friendly (as they claim) they could just build walkable neighborhoods.
>>1990776did anyone actually think this bullshit would work
>>1990776It was more than obvious this wouldn't work. I can't imagine a person optimistic enough to think that it will work
>>1990781>Just fucking let me move to the netherlands already work...You're going to regret this
>>1995630Fuck if only, I went through some NEOM job listings for kicks. If someone offered me 100k/year or more (twice my income) and it was guaranteed for a few years I'd move almost anywhere. I really want to buy a house and get a business visa in Japan.
>>1995625>zero cultureWho needs that when you can just import whatever culture the wealthy want and pay big dick foreign architects and artists to fill in the gaps? NEOM is intentionally far away from the Islamic despotism tin the rest of KSA. NEOM conceptually is a very shiny slice of well planned authoritarianism. Think Brasília, Naypyidaw, or the Cairo NAC. These are enclaves built for the elites and/or military so they can physically be separated from the lower classes. In NEOM the social contract will ask that you be wealthy (by international standards) and that you don't fuck around with the social order, criticize the monarchy, etc. In other words so long as you have money (bonus points for political and/or industrial connections) and aren't a disrupting force MBS will keep all the poors and undesirables out. White collar working professionals that can't buy an EU passport can usually be trusted to be part of the social fabric. Much the same with the service workers and laborers that can't be automated away (yet). They'll either be kept out of sight or they'll be the "right" ethnicity for public viewing. Most of the desirables cities people of means want to live in already practice forms of class segregation, usually by cost of living alone. Other than parts of NYC and Miami all the desirable cities rich people want to move to are in the EU. That presents a problem with the ongoing and soon to be worse immigration crisis and the general state of things, to say nothing of Russia on their doorstep. In Asia the only options worth considering for long term stability are Singapore (see 'Disneyland with the Death Penalty') and Japan. While I love Japan it's culture is in decline, economy stagnant, and it's too xenophobic for non-weebs of wealth to consider. There's too much friction in daily life. NEOM exists to be an elite enclave. They're selling the wealthy on stability and keeping the poors inline, if not out altogether.
>>1990926It's "New Money" syndrome. Old Money people wouldn't do that shit.
>>1995274That Gulf of Aqaba shit was obviously a cop-out to transform NEOM into a resort hotel district, because everyone knew already that the large city projects, such as The Line and Oxagon would miserably fail.Making a lot of luxury hotels next to each other is cheaper and easier than a gigantic futuristic city and you can grab money from deluded billionaires instead of attracting pesky citizens
>>1997168>class mobility is badHow did the 99% get this psyopped, an arab in the middle east did something uncool therefore kids in america should be in debtor's prison if their parents don't pay the school lunch bill, this is your brain on libertarianism
>>1997175Nah, I'm not against new people getting rich. I'm just pointing out that new rich people have a annoying tendency of being tacky to prove their richness to everyone.
>>1997196It's the same thing, you're just hiding behind the "it's subjective" copout. If old money does a thing it's a sign of their godlike taste that has nothing to prove, or at worst, even if it would be seen as irredeemably revolting when detached from the person doing it, then it's "whimsical" or "eclectic.But if new money does the same thing it's tacky and awful and a sign that the peasants ought to stay poor because they wouldn't know what to do with money even if they got it.All use of "nouveau riche" as an pejorative should be called out as simping for feudalism, because that's what it is.
>>1990784The Netherlands is dead flat and the whole country has less people than some urban areas in the US. The whole Amsterdam metro area wouldn't even make it into the top 20 in the US. If people actually want Dutch-style walkability and bikeability in the US they need to stop trying to retrofit it into megacities that aren't suited to it and should be advocating for decentralization into numerous smaller towns and cities that can be developed from scratch with the right infrastructure, but instead they just migrate en masse to a few gigantic urban areas and then complain that solutions that work in areas with a million people aren't working in ones with 10+ million.
>>1997198Whatever dude. You are neither
>>1997223I hope the old money sees this bro!
>>1997198Stop using words when you don't know what they mean. Nouveau riche is when you buy a Lamborghini, a closet full of Armani suits, and seven Rolex watches to be a big gaudy billboard screaming "LOOK AT ME I HAVE MONEY" to the world. Old money doesn't do that shit, they get stuff that's expensive because it's well made or rare, not because it's flashy. And when old money does stupid nouveau riche things, their parents threaten to make them poor. Old money doesn't buy status symbols, it buys status.
>>1997248See >>1997225
>>1997249I'm not simping for anyone, ESL-kun, I just don't appreciate dumbasses redefining words on the fly in the neverending war against objective reality.
>>1997250I hope the old money sees this bro
>>1997175>>1997198>>1997225Imagine sperging out this bad because someone said "new rich" people such as gulf arabs are tacky.Holy fuck dude, get a grip
>>1997288But it's not even correct, the house of saud has been rich for like 300 years, I realize that's "new money" by yurolard standards but it pretty much counts as old money anywhere else in the world
