Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Saudi Crown Prince unveils plans for $500bn structure to house 9M people

twitter.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

161–170 of 264 posts

Re: Saudi Crown Prince unveils plans for $500bn structure to house 9M people

#161

Post by lr »

lordnacho wrote: post #113
apexalpha wrote: post #94

Bloomberg has a good running series on this 'city of the future'. As you will expect consultants are making good money on this. I personally can't get enough of this foolish mega-project, I love the dry reporting on it. Here's one of the latest: https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2022-mbs-neom-saudi-arabi... There was also a very telling interview with architects, builders, concept people etc... and after talking abo…

A friend of mine works on the NEOM project, and it really is like winning the lottery. Remote work with an occasional field trip to look at the place. But Google level salary to tell them how to save some data. The scale of the feeding trough is unimaginable. I saw an advert for NEOM on Piccadilly Circus, the whole entire e-wall, and the place isn't even built yet, so I'm not sure if they're using it to recruit. It's…

People can’t seem to get enough of science fiction, but every time something is presented that would move the needle in that direction, the detractors line up in droves. With attitudes like this, it really will be the 25th century before humanity does do anything of significance (if we even live that long).

Re: Saudi Crown Prince unveils plans for $500bn structure to house 9M people

#162

Post by ddalex »

IIAOPSW wrote: post #123
ddalex wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you would be the designer of this thing, how soon would you want the gig to be up ? The purpose of this thing is not economical, or political, or social - the purpose is to satisfy the ego of an autocrat, and as long as that ego is getting stroked, the money will continue to flow.

Oh, so the purpose of this thing is political.

I would argue against that, because I don't see any way that this projects supports either the internal or external policies of the kingdom - in order to support that, it would need to be realistic and credible, and its neither.

Re: Saudi Crown Prince unveils plans for $500bn structure to house 9M people

#163

Post by Kukumber »

A lot of skepticism in this thread, even some form of jealousy

It's better than the soviet union like buildings they are promoting everywhere in the world, including in the US

We need to optimize cities as much as possible, that's for sure, this project is a step in the right direction

Re: Saudi Crown Prince unveils plans for $500bn structure to house 9M people

#164

Post by mkj »

Dan42 wrote: post #125

I doubt it will get built, but they really have people who understand the fundamental concepts behind Arcology. Honestly I'm surprised at how many parts of the design are well thought-out and well adapted to the desert environment. Sunlight from the sides, but not so much that it overheats the city. Heat escapes up. 5-minute walkable neighborhoods. The proximity to services of cities combined with the roominess of su…

Even if you like urbanism, this promotional video (from neom themselves) has convinced me that it would be dystopian. All the nuance and uniqueness of places replaced with a homogeneous form, nope.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rs-10eEGEe0 "How would Manhattan look with the vertical urbanism being adopted for THE LINE?"

Re: Saudi Crown Prince unveils plans for $500bn structure to house 9M people

#165

Post by code_runner »

taink wrote: post #137
Dan42 wrote: post #125

I doubt it will get built, but they really have people who understand the fundamental concepts behind Arcology. Honestly I'm surprised at how many parts of the design are well thought-out and well adapted to the desert environment. Sunlight from the sides, but not so much that it overheats the city. Heat escapes up. 5-minute walkable neighborhoods. The proximity to services of cities combined with the roominess of su…

Reminds me of atrium-like structures but extended to a massive scale to fit cities. [1] Regardless of the feasibility of this mega-project, what concerns me is how difficult it would be to escape from living in what is essentially a big mall. Maybe that's what feels dystopian to most people here? [1] https://youtu.be/VuOyygDRN-w

That’s what does it for me. You live in a weird tube and all of the nature is artificial. If you do leave, you’re in the desert.

Re: Saudi Crown Prince unveils plans for $500bn structure to house 9M people

#166

Post by panick21_ »

daenz wrote: post #48
inversefft wrote: post #9

City of the future built by a government stuck in the dark ages.

I'd prefer it to a city of the dark ages built by a government of the future.

I would prefer a city of the dark ages MANAGED by government of the present. And since the dark ages are just part of the middle ages and we stretch our definition a bit, that's mostly what we have in Europe.

Re: Saudi Crown Prince unveils plans for $500bn structure to house 9M people

#167

Post by jjeaff »

baby wrote: post #130

I’m getting flashbacks of the dubai palm island when they were constructing it. Everyone was wondering why, and who would even live there. But they don’t care, these places are basically like NFTs, they make so much money selling spots that it does not matter.

It's not a guarantee. Around the time when they built the palm island thing, they also build the islands that look like a world map. Quite a bit of what was built is now melting into the ocean, never built on and unmaintained.

Re: Saudi Crown Prince unveils plans for $500bn structure to house 9M people

#168

Post by panick21_ »

ahamedirshad123 wrote: post #27
inversefft wrote: post #9

City of the future built by a government stuck in the dark ages.

That's applicable for the US too.

Not really. The US had its absurd large scale infrastructure spending. Looking at you Robert Moses. But they didn't just walk out into a field and start planning insane cities.

Re: Saudi Crown Prince unveils plans for $500bn structure to house 9M people

#170

Post by anodari »

bayesian_horse wrote: post #57
neals wrote: post #11

Make it a circle, get rid of the mirror, fill in the center. Bam! You got yourself a city.

A circle is harder to build and has more issues regarding sunlight. The sun hitting the building(s) is both a benefit (solar cells) and a problem (heat generation) at the same time. A linear structure will get a much more even energy distribution than a circle. Also one of the goals of the project is to reduce the energy needs of the population by making ways shorter. If you spread a city out on a circle, you got a m…

Also, a circle, you couldn't expand indefinitely
Post reply on HN