The Line, Saudi Arabia
Imagine a city where cars, streets, and carbon emissions are relics of the past—a visionary metropolis stretching for 170 kilometers, housed within a single, mirrored building. This is The Line, Saudi Arabia's ambitious endeavor to redefine urban living in the heart of the desert. But creating a perfectly self-contained, linear utopia comes with immense challenges and profound questions about its feasibility and impact. The Line is envisioned as a colossal, 170-kilometer-long linear city, designed to house 9 million people within a single, mirrored structure, aiming for a car-free, zero-carbon existence. It promises a technologically advanced lifestyle, powered by renewable energy and managed by AI, where all essential services are accessible within a five-minute walk. Despite its futuristic appeal, The Line faces significant hurdles, including astronomical costs, technological feasibility gaps, environmental concerns, and serious human rights criticisms regarding land displacement.
AI Summary
Imagine a city where cars, streets, and carbon emissions are relics of the past—a visionary metropolis stretching for 170 kilometers, housed within a single, mirrored building. This is The Line, Saudi Arabia's ambitious endeavor to redefine urban living in the heart of the desert. But creating a perfectly self-contained, linear utopia comes with immense challenges and profound questions about its feasibility and impact.
- The Line is envisioned as a colossal, 170-kilometer-long linear city, designed to house 9 million people within a single, mirrored structure, aiming for a car-free, zero-carbon existence.
- It promises a technologically advanced lifestyle, powered by renewable energy and managed by AI, where all essential services are accessible within a five-minute walk.
- Despite its futuristic appeal, The Line faces significant hurdles, including astronomical costs, technological feasibility gaps, environmental concerns, and serious human rights criticisms regarding land displacement.
The City of Tomorrow, Today?
In the vast desert landscape of Saudi Arabia, a revolutionary urban concept is taking shape: The Line. It's not just a city; it's a planned smart city within Neom, designed as a single, monumental structure—a linear settlement stretching across the land.
This colossal vision aims to entirely remove cars, streets, and carbon emissions from urban life. The Line is conceived as a blueprint for sustainable living, promising an environment unlike any other currently existing on Earth.
A Mirrored Monolith in the Desert
Picture this: a city 170 kilometers (110 miles) long, yet only 200 meters (660 feet) wide, soaring 500 meters (1,600 feet) into the sky. It's designed to accommodate an astonishing nine million people, roughly a quarter of Saudi Arabia's 2022 population.
The exterior will be a continuous glass mirror, reflecting the desert and sky, making it appear almost camouflaged against its surroundings. Inside, the promise is radical convenience: all basic services and amenities will be within a mere five-minute walking distance for residents.
Layers of Innovation
The Line isn't just a building; it's a multi-layered ecosystem. The surface layer is dedicated entirely to pedestrians, fostering a tranquil, car-free environment. Below ground, two additional layers hum with activity.
One underground layer handles essential infrastructure, keeping the city running seamlessly. The other is reserved for ultra-fast transportation, ensuring residents can traverse the immense length of the city in minutes—a crucial element for a linear design.
Powered by Renewables, Guided by AI
A cornerstone of The Line's design is its commitment to sustainability. The entire city is planned to run exclusively on renewable energy, striving for a truly zero-carbon footprint in its operations.
Artificial intelligence is intended to be the city's nervous system, constantly monitoring and optimizing daily life. Using predictive and data models, AI aims to anticipate needs, improve services, and enhance the living experience for its inhabitants—even reportedly paying residents for submitting their data to the system.
Unprecedented Density
With nine million residents in such a narrow footprint, The Line proposes an average population density of 260,000 people per square kilometer. To put that in perspective, Manila, one of the world's most densely populated cities, had a density of around 44,000 per square kilometer in 2020.
This extreme density, combined with its 500-meter height, would make it one of the tallest structures globally—a true marvel of vertical urbanism, dwarfing most existing cityscapes.
Echoes of the Past
While revolutionary, the idea of a linear city isn't entirely new. As far back as 1882, Spanish urban planner Arturo Soria imagined a linear city built around a tramway, even implementing part of his vision in Madrid before it ultimately failed.
Later, in the 1950s, French architect Yona Friedman proposed a modular, vertical 'spatial city' to combat urban sprawl. And in the 1960s, the Italian avant-garde group Superstudio presented the 'Continuous Monument'—a radical, albeit unfeasible, critique of urbanisation and capitalism.
The Grand Announcement and Initial Excavations
The Line was first unveiled on January 10, 2021, by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, as a flagship project of Saudi Vision 2030, which aims to diversify the country's economy away from oil.
By October 2021, earthworks had already begun, marking the ambitious start of construction. Satellite imagery from 2022 confirmed significant excavation activity along the entire planned length of the project, demonstrating concrete progress.
This initial phase of construction has been a monumental undertaking, employing over 100,000 workers around the clock. A dedicated concrete factory, capable of producing 20,000 cubic meters of concrete daily, was commissioned to meet the immense material demands.
A Hidden Marina and Hyper-Speed Transit
Part of The Line's intricate design includes a colossal 'Hidden Marina,' envisioned to be twice the size of existing marinas. This facility, located away from the immediate coastline, will feature a tunnel and canal large enough for cruise ships to pass through, opening to residents and visitors by 2030.
Crucially, the 'Spine' of The Line is an underground railway designed for speed. Early plans projected trains capable of 510 kilometers per hour (317 mph), potentially whisking passengers from one end of the 170 km city to the other in just 20 minutes.
The Price of a Dream
The financial scope of The Line is staggering, with initial estimates ranging from US$100 to $200 billion. Some projections have even soared as high as $1 trillion for the entire project. The Saudi Public Investment Fund (PIF) committed to providing half of the estimated $320 billion for the first phase alone.
Saudi officials claim the project will create 460,000 jobs, significantly diversify the national economy, and contribute roughly $48 billion to Saudi GDP by 2030. These economic benefits are central to the 'Vision 2030' strategy.
Scaling Back or Staying the Course?
In early 2024, reports from sources like Bloomberg News and The Wall Street Journal suggested that the project's ambitious scale might be facing reductions due to funding constraints and a lack of critical mass from foreign direct investors.
These reports indicated that by 2030, only a 2.4-kilometer (1.5-mile) section might be completed, housing fewer than 300,000 residents, a significant reduction from the originally planned 1.5 million for that timeframe.
However, Saudi officials have firmly rejected these claims, asserting that the project's intended scale remains unchanged. As of late 2024, the government reiterated its aim to complete a 5-kilometer central segment by 2030, pushing the full 170-kilometer completion target to 2045.
Despite official denials, some internal draft reports cited by the Wall Street Journal suggested a full completion date as late as 2080, with an astronomical cost of $8.8 trillion—twenty-five times the annual Saudi budget—fueling ongoing debate about the project's true long-term viability.
A City Under Scrutiny
From an urban planning perspective, The Line has drawn both awe and concern. Critics question the practicality of its slick, futuristic aesthetic, pointing out potential dangers like high-altitude ledges and the monotony of a 170-kilometer-long linear profile.
Architects have raised concerns about the building's impact on wind flow through its internal spaces. Others highlight the inherent inefficiency of a linear city for communal interaction, where inhabitants are
In fact, researchers from the Vienna Complexity Science Hub found that the average distance between any two inhabitants in a linear city like The Line would be 57 kilometers, compared to just 2.9 kilometers in a more compact circular city. This significantly impacts accessibility and travel time.
\text{Average distance in linear city} = 57\text{ km} \\ \text{Average distance in circular city} = 2.9\text{ km}Furthermore, a 170-kilometer-long, 500-meter-high mirrored barrier could have catastrophic environmental consequences, disrupting adjacent ecosystems and acting as a formidable obstacle for migratory bird species, similar to massive highways.
The colossal amount of glass, steel, and concrete required to construct such a megastructure would generate an immense carbon footprint—estimated at 1.8 gigatonnes of CO2 equivalent—posing a stark contradiction to its stated sustainability goals.
Human Rights and Surveillance Concerns
Beyond its architectural and environmental impacts, The Line faces severe criticisms regarding human rights. Digital rights researchers have warned that the city's extensive data collection through AI could transform it into a
Perhaps most disturbingly, reports have emerged of the forced displacement of the indigenous Huwaitat tribe to make way for the Neom project. In 2022, three tribal members were sentenced to death for refusing to vacate their villages, following a previous incident where another tribal member was shot dead for opposing displacement.
Article
The Line, Saudi Arabia
The Line (Arabic: ذا لاين) is a planned linear settlement under construction in Neom, Tabuk Province, Saudi Arabia, to be housed entirely in a single very long arcology. It is planned to be a smart city with no cars, streets or carbon emissions. The project was conceived of by Saudi ruler Mohammed bin Salman, who was the hands-on chair of the project.
The initial plan called for the city to span 170 kilometres (110 mi) at a height of 500 m (1,600 ft) and a width of 200 metres (660 ft), with the capacity to accommodate a population of 9 million (25% of Saudi Arabia's 2022 population of 35.5 million). The Line was planned to have an entirely glass mirror exterior, with all basic services within a five-minute walking distance. The city is one of the five announced regions of Neom and is a part of Saudi Vision 2030 project.
The plan was announced in 2021 and has persistently been criticized for unrealistic costs and timelines, an impractical shape, environmental harms, and human rights violations. Thousands of people have been forcibly moved to make way for the project and villages have been razed. In 2025, the Wall Street Journal reported on an internal audit of the megaproject which found extensive problems, including "evidence of deliberate manipulation", by the managers of the project. By 2025, the megaproject had been substantially scaled down.
Saudi Arabia stated that it aimed to complete central a 5 km (3.1 mi) segment by 2030, with completion of the full 170 km (110 mi) project in 2045. In 2024, the Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg reported that the first phase would only be 2.4 km (1.5 mi) long; Saudi officials denied this and stated that the project was continuing as planned.
In 2024, after $50 billion had been spent, the project was reported to be facing problems of large cost increases, many long delays, and a possible lack of the critical mass of inhabitants needed to make the city a modern business hub. The aim had become to complete the first half-mile section in 2034. The Wall Street Journal said that a 2023 draft board presentation estimated completion in 2080 at a cost of $8.8 trillion—25 times the annual Saudi budget—and $370 billion by 2035 for the first phase, mostly funded by the Saudi state, with the hope of later private investment.
As of the end of 2025, the project appears to have been suspended and no construction work is taking place. International media described The Line as a "likely failure".
Proposal
The Line, Saudi Arabia
Artist's conception of the outdoor interior space within The Line
The Line is planned to eventually extend 170 kilometres (110 miles) from near the Red Sea to the city of Tabuk, and to accommodate up to nine million residents, with a projected average population density of 260,000 per square kilometre (670,000/sq mi), six times that of Manila, the world's most densely populated city in 2020 (44,000 per square kilometre (110,000/sq mi)). The Line's design consists of two mirrored buildings with an outdoor space in between, having a total width of 200 metres (660 ft) and a height of 500 metres (1,600 ft). This would make it the third-tallest building in the country, after the Abraj Al-Bait Clock Tower and the Jeddah Tower, and approximately the 12th-tallest building in the world.
The city is to be powered entirely by renewable energy. It will consist of three layers: one on the surface for pedestrians, one underground for infrastructure, and another underground for transportation. Artificial intelligence will monitor the city and use predictive and data models to find ways to improve daily life for its citizens, with residents being paid for submitting data to The Line.
The estimated construction cost is US$100–200 billion (400–700 billion SAR), with some estimates as high as $1 trillion. It is claimed by the Saudi government that it will create 460,000 jobs, spur economic diversification, and contribute 180 billion SAR (US$48 billion) to domestic GDP by 2030. According to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in 2022, the first phase project is expected to cost SAR 1.2 trillion (US$320 billion), and the Saudi sovereign wealth fund Public Investment Fund (PIF) would provide half of the sum.
Feasibility
According to architect and urban planner Etienne Bou-Abdo, "the 3D images presented are not classical 3D architecture images", and the designers of the project "have rather called upon video game designers". Bou-Abdo stated that the plan included "a lot of technology that we don't have today". Many of the project's key announcements, particularly in the areas of energy and transportation, were based on technologies that did not exist even in prototype form.
Reported scaling back
In April 2024, it was reported that the project had been "scaled back" after foreign direct investment investors had not "bought into the crown prince's vision", according to Torbjorn Soltvedt, principal analyst at risk consultancy firm Maplecroft. Fluctuating global oil prices had contributed to the decision. The Line was expected to complete an initial section of 2.4 km (1.5 mi) in length by 2030, with a population of 300,000 rather than the intended 1.5 million.
The Saudi minister of economy and planning rejected the claims of scaling back. He said in an interview during a World Economic Forum special meeting in Riyadh in 2024 that "For NEOM, the projects, the intended scale is continuing as planned. There is no change in scale". As of October 2024, Saudi Arabia intended to complete a 5 km (3.1 mi) central segment of The Line by 2030. Completion of the full 170 km (110 mi) project was rescheduled for 2045.
It was reported in August 2025 that Saudi Arabia's sovereign wealth fund had written down $8 billion from major projects, including the Neom development. According to The Times, "many of the projects faced delays and cost overruns and had reportedly been scaled back." Neom faced "repeated delays" after other infrastructure projects were given priority.
On September 16, 2025, the Saudi sovereign wealth fund PIF suspended work on the construction project until further notice.
Planning
The Line, Saudi Arabia
The Line contains elements of architectural ideas from the industrial era.
• In 1882, the Spanish urban planner Arturo Soria imagined a linear city based on innovative use of the tramway. He applied part of his idea to a neighborhood in Madrid, but lack of support ended the scheme. • In the 1950s, the French architect Yona Friedman proposed the concept of an integrated, modular and vertical "spatial city" to solve the problem of urban sprawl, but the idea remained an intellectual curiosity. • In the 1960s, the Italian avant-garde group Superstudio presented a radical artistic project: the continuous monument, "an architectural model for total urbanization", which was supposed to cover the entire Earth but without any feasibility or real utility. The proposal was a criticism of Modernism, monumentality, design and capitalism.
The first plan for The Line was announced on 10 January 2021 by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in a presentation broadcast on state television. Earthworks began in October 2021, and crews working on the project were to move in during 2024. As of July 2022, the first phase of the project was scheduled to be completed in 2030. Bin Salman, as chairman of the Neom board of directors, released a statement and promotional video on 25 July 2021 which led to more widespread media coverage of the project. This caused questions to be raised about the merits of the design and environmental issues, with critics concerned that the project would create a "dystopian" and "artificial" facility that had already displaced the Huwaitat indigenous tribe and would impact the migration of birds and wildlife.
Architects
The project management required all architects to sign confidentiality agreements, which is why there are no references to The Line on any of their websites. German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung learned that two architects had terminated their participation in the project because of human rights and ecological concerns: Norman Foster and Francine Houben from Mecanoo. The paper also reported that several high-ranking architects were still on board: David Adjaye, Ben van Berkel (UN Studios), Massimiliano Fuksas, the London office of the late Zaha Hadid, Rem Koolhaas, the Laboratory for Visionary Architecture (LAVA), Delugan Meissl, and Wolf D. Prix from Coop Himmelb(l)au. The Süddeutsche criticized the lack of sustainability and the double standards of the architects in moral issues. In November 2024, it was announced that Delugan Meissl and Gensler had been appointed as the architects for phase one of the project.
Construction
The Line, Saudi Arabia
Excavation progress of The Line (marked with blue arrows, 150-kilometre (95-mile) ruler for scale), October 2022
By October 2022, construction was under way, with excavation taking place along the entire length of the project. Saudi Arabia commissioned a SAR 700 million (almost US$190 million) multi-plant concrete factory capable of producing up to 20,000 cubic meters (roughly 700,000 cubic ft) of concrete per day. By October 2024, over 100,000 workers were preparing the initial grading, working around the clock.
The Spine
Early plans proposed an underground railway with 510-kilometre-per-hour (317 mph) trains that could travel from one end of The Line to the other in 20 minutes. As of 2023, short tunnels had been dug for the start of the railway, while a train was in a prototype stage of development.
Modules 40–50
By March 2023, more than 4,500 piles had been driven in module 43, reaching a peak of 60 piles per day. Piling work then shifted towards modules 45, 46 and 47, located at The Hidden Marina. Excavation of about 1 million cubic metres (35 million cubic feet) of earth was taking place each week at the marina.
The Hidden Marina
The design includes a marina, twice the size of existing marinas, on the northern side of the buildings, away from the sea. The plan calls for a tunnel and canal to be made through The Line, large enough for large cruise ships to pass through. Construction started in April 2022, aiming to open to visitors and residents by 2030. As of February 2024, over 90 million cubic metres of material had been moved.
Dewatering system
As part of The Line, the world's largest dewatering system is proposed.
Reception
Urban planning and environmental concerns
In an interview with Dezeen, Marshall Brown of Princeton University said that, while he believed in such large-scale urban planning, it would be difficult to achieve the slick, futuristic aesthetic seen in the concept art for the project because of the large number of factors involved: for example, one of the images depicts a picnic on a 200-metre-high (660 ft) ledge, which would probably be dangerous in real life. Hélène Chartier of C40 Cities compared The Line to other unrealised linear city projects, such as Soria's 1882 design and a 1965 proposal in New Jersey. Dutch architect Winy Maas said that while he would love to live in such an environment, its profile as seen in the concept art was monotonous, and he believed it would facilitate unfavorable wind flow through the interior.
Philip Oldfield of the University of New South Wales said that the quality of life would probably come down to whether the city was well-managed, rather than to its visual flair. Oldfield said the project would have a carbon footprint of about 1.8 gigatonnes (2,000 million short tons) of CO2 equivalent in the glass, steel, and concrete, because "you cannot build a 500-metre-tall [1,600 ft] building out of low-carbon materials". He said the 170-kilometre (110-mile) profile would create a large-scale barrier to adjacent ecosystems and migratory species similar to that created by highways, and the mirrored exterior facade would be dangerous for birds.
Researchers from the Vienna Complexity Science Hub suggested that a circular city of a 3.3 km (2.1 mi) radius would have had much shorter commuting times than a linear city. The average distance between two inhabitants of a linear city would be 57 km (35 mi), as opposed to 2.9 km (1.8 mi) for a circular city. In a linear city, each inhabitant would have only 1.2% of the population in walking distance as "people are as far away from others as possible", as opposed to 24% in a circular city. In a linear city, walking and cycling would not be popular and travel time in a fast train would be disproportionately long, while a compact circular city would allow active mobility and fast trains would not be needed. The required density in a circular city would be much lower, which would allow it to be built with existing technology, reducing the environmental footprint of buildings. A railway line disruption would immobilize a linear city, but have less impact on a circular city.
Concerns about policy and human rights
Digital rights researchers such as Vincent Mosco have suggested that the city's data collection scheme could make it a "surveillance city", because of arrangements that would distort consent to sharing data, and because Saudi Arabia's poor human rights record might imply potential misuse of data. Neom CEO Joseph Bradley said that the Neom coordinators were resolving privacy issues and that Saudi Arabia had a personal data protection law.
Aside from the merits of the projected city, there was also scrutiny of the actions of the Saudi government in pursuing the project. In October 2022, three men of the Howeitat tribe, Shadli, Ibrahim, and Ataullah al-Huwaiti, were sentenced to death when they refused to vacate their village as part of the NEOM project. Shadli al-Huwaiti was the brother of Abdul Rahim al-Huwaiti, who was shot dead by security forces in April 2020 in his home in Al-Khariba, in the part of Tabuk province earmarked for NEOM, after he posted videos on social media opposing the displacement of local residents to make way for the project. In response to reports of human rights violations, one company, Solar Winds, pulled out of the project in 2022.