Open SEZ: Special Economic Zones & Cities - 新乡市城

By George ELIOT Saudi Arabia's ambitious development project NEOM is gaining traction, but the part of it known as "The Line" is for the most part a strategic urban planning mistake. " The Line " is a proposed linear city within NEOM, in northwestern Saudi Arabia. It is supposed to eventually house up to nine million people in a 170-kilometer-long, 200-metre-wide single continuous building that resembles a horizontally-laid skyscraper. Perhaps there is some justification for the part of The Line that follows the Red Sea coast to be a thin development, as coastal projects and beachfront property ribbons typically follow the shape of the beach. However, the part that goes further inland is totally irrational from a development point to continue as a straight line.  All major and minor cities in the world are blobs of concentric agglomeration. And even cities that cannot grow inland because of mountains (e.g. Hong Kong Island) or swamps (e.g. Miami) try to build up...