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End of the Line? Saudi Arabia to scale back plans for desert megacity

theguardian.com

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Re: End of the Line? Saudi Arabia to scale back plans for desert megacity

#221

Post by Ahmd72 »

dappermanneke wrote: post #216
Ahmd72 wrote: post #214

The sheer arrogance of Westerners is one of the reasons I'm so biased against them and letting them enter any of the Muslim countries, like come on are we supposed to be taking lessons from people who gave us the Holocaust, the World wars, the Iraq war, the forceful displacement of Palestinians so they can create their own country. Are you people really that blind that you think whatever you think or values you have…

[flagged]

I'm not a Saudi, and just saying this proves my point about your people, just assumptions and thinking you are right

Re: End of the Line? Saudi Arabia to scale back plans for desert megacity

#222

Post by ctrw »

Simon_ORourke wrote: post #61
delta_p_delta_x wrote: post #43

The only thing the Gulf states have going for them is oil money and a good hub location on the Europe–Southeast Asia airline routes. Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Riyadh, Bahrain, Qatar, they all remind me of that quote from King of the Hill—they are monuments to man's arrogance. Desert cities hitting 50+ °C air temperature at midday which means air conditioning everywhere; vapid luxury in the form of expensive garish cars, shop…

> local chiefs who oppose stupid and unrealistic white elephant vanity projects are executed. Let's not gloss over the absolutely appalling respect many of these societies have for human dignity. Public executions and flogging, discrimination and imprisonment based solely on gender, absolutely zero regard for freedom of conscience when it comes to matters of religion. There's only so much you can get away with by say…

Let's not gloss over the fact that we in the west do the same. Only we hide the slaves in sweatshops so our sensibilities aren't triggered.

It is after all much easier to change hearts and minds in a democracy.

Re: End of the Line? Saudi Arabia to scale back plans for desert megacity

#223

Post by [deleted] »

lupusreal wrote: post #131
jannw wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not so daft if you consider that it is easier to segment, stratify, and control people in a linear city, as the structure itself acts as a continuous and infinitely adaptable choke point. This seems consistent with Saudi elite's ideas on managing their society.

That explains why it might have been an appealing concept to the inceptor but it's still daft and it was obvious to me from the start that it wouldn't actually be made. I still don't know why anybody humored the premise of this thing getting built.

[deleted]

Re: End of the Line? Saudi Arabia to scale back plans for desert megacity

#224

Post by JaimeThompson »

EduardoBautista wrote: post #143
yreg wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dubai lives from tourism now. Of course, it was bootstrapped by oil.

It also makes money from construction projects. It’s one of the big reasons they offer residence visas to people who buy real estate there. I live in Dubai but grew up in the United States. Despite what people may believe, there is freedom of religion here, women aren’t oppressed, and the government genuinely cares about having a good city to live in.

Less than 10 years ago Dubai arrested a British woman for reporting a rape, that is rather oppressive.

Re: End of the Line? Saudi Arabia to scale back plans for desert megacity

#225

Post by Symbiote »

tomp wrote: post #135
keiferski wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

UAE is well on its way to being the Switzerland of the Middle East and Indian Ocean. Your rhetoric sounds like it’s from 2003.

Switzerland isn't the most progressive of countries (it only gave women the right to vote in 1971) but AFAIK you don't go to jail if you fuck a man in the ass, in contrast to UAE. Not something that directly concerns me, but I'm personally more worried about restrictions on freedom of speech, but regardless not somewhere I'd be willing to live (I currently do live in Switzerland).

You should be worried about gay rights: some years ago, a French teenage boy was raped by some local men, and the authorities initially tried to get the boy to confess.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gang_rape has some more examples.

Re: End of the Line? Saudi Arabia to scale back plans for desert megacity

#226

Post by axlee »

ctrw wrote: post #222
Simon_ORourke wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> local chiefs who oppose stupid and unrealistic white elephant vanity projects are executed. Let's not gloss over the absolutely appalling respect many of these societies have for human dignity. Public executions and flogging, discrimination and imprisonment based solely on gender, absolutely zero regard for freedom of conscience when it comes to matters of religion. There's only so much you can get away with by say…

Let's not gloss over the fact that we in the west do the same. Only we hide the slaves in sweatshops so our sensibilities aren't triggered. It is after all much easier to change hearts and minds in a democracy.

> Let's not gloss over the fact that we in the west do the same. Only we hide the slaves in sweatshops so our sensibilities aren't triggered.

Totally: Norway and Saudi Arabia are exactly the same in terms of humanism, it's just a matter of optics, right?

Re: End of the Line? Saudi Arabia to scale back plans for desert megacity

#227

Post by radicalbyte »

smashah wrote: post #170
Simon_ORourke wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> local chiefs who oppose stupid and unrealistic white elephant vanity projects are executed. Let's not gloss over the absolutely appalling respect many of these societies have for human dignity. Public executions and flogging, discrimination and imprisonment based solely on gender, absolutely zero regard for freedom of conscience when it comes to matters of religion. There's only so much you can get away with by say…

[flagged]

It's not Biden, it's part of the 90% of American policy which will never change no matter who the President is.

Re: End of the Line? Saudi Arabia to scale back plans for desert megacity

#228

Post by Symbiote »

keiferski wrote: post #146
tomp wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Switzerland isn't the most progressive of countries (it only gave women the right to vote in 1971) but AFAIK you don't go to jail if you fuck a man in the ass, in contrast to UAE. Not something that directly concerns me, but I'm personally more worried about restrictions on freedom of speech, but regardless not somewhere I'd be willing to live (I currently do live in Switzerland).

I used Switzerland as an example because of its financial industry. I wasn’t making any commentary on the culture. Presumably if the UAE is the Switzerland of the Middle East and Indian Ocean, it’s more adapted for that cultural environment and not for what Westerners are looking for. These laws are also pretty much never enforced in UAE, as far as I understand.

The laws are enforced enough that the British government gives a warning about them for visitors to the UAE.

https://www.gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice/united-arab-emirate...

Re: End of the Line? Saudi Arabia to scale back plans for desert megacity

#229

Post by avar »

RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #95
delta_p_delta_x wrote: post #43

The only thing the Gulf states have going for them is oil money and a good hub location on the Europe–Southeast Asia airline routes. Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Riyadh, Bahrain, Qatar, they all remind me of that quote from King of the Hill—they are monuments to man's arrogance. Desert cities hitting 50+ °C air temperature at midday which means air conditioning everywhere; vapid luxury in the form of expensive garish cars, shop…

> Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Riyadh, Bahrain, Qatar, they all remind me of that quote from King of the Hill—they are monuments to man's arrogance. Do you also call Amsterdam with its dikes and below sea level, “a monument to man’s arrogance? Wasn’t the moon landing a monument to man’s arrogance? I think calling something “a monument to man’s arrogance” reveals more about the biases of the person saying it than about the actua…

    > Do you also call Amsterdam
    > with its dikes and below sea
    > level, “a monument to man’s
    > arrogance?
Amsterdam mostly isn't below sea level[1], nor is most of the Netherlands's area that people inhabit.

1. https://www.floodmap.net/elevation/CountryElevationMap/?ct=N...

Re: End of the Line? Saudi Arabia to scale back plans for desert megacity

#230

Post by jasongill »

alangibson wrote: post #217
avar wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With the caveat that all published "plans" for the thing were probably meant as a PR stunt the plan called for passively cooling it[1]. That part actually doesn't seem implausible, it's right on the Red Sea, which is quite hot on the surface, but cools down as you you go deeper into it[2]. So (and this is just my speculation) they could have a large undersea pipeline to a depth of say 1km, and use the heat the buildi…

How are we pumping the water if the power is out? I guess they're would be diesel generators for that in reality. We need an engineer to calculate the flow needed because given how far away the far end is from the water that could end up behind one huge generator, not to mention the size of the pipes. It's worth mentioning that they don't seem to be burying any massive water pipes so this isn't likely to be done in r…

Gravity? This is what water towers are for.

(not to say that this project isn't a total farce, but at least the issue of pumping water without electricity was solved hundreds of years ago)

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