Saudi Arabia's NEOM: Oasis or Sand Castle? - Bloomberg:
"The promotional video for NEOM, Saudi Arabia's proposed $500 billion city of the future announced on Tuesday, errs toward the dreamy and inspirational end of the artistic spectrum. But I couldn't shake the feeling it might also be perfect as the happy prelude to some dystopian movie where society drowns in its own hubris.
NEOM debuted at a conference this week in Riyadh, dubbed "Davos in the desert" and effectively a giant marketing pitch to draw in dollars as part of Saudi Arabia's effort to reform its oil-dependent economy. It manages to be simultaneously ambitious and derivative -- which underscores a central challenge facing the country and the global oil market that depends on it.
On the ambitious side of the ledger, offering people "a lifestyle that surpasses that of any other metropolis" isn't even NEOM's most aggressive claim. It is supposed to cover just over 10,000 square miles of desert in Saudi Arabia's northwestern corner -- big enough to accommodate about 37 Singapores."
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