The BBC’s Sylvia Smith checks in on development at the King Abdullah Economic City north of Jeddah, one of four “megacity” projects envisioned by King Abdullah to be developed in the coming years.
At a cost of $100bn, Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah Economic City (KAEC) is currently only 15% completed.
“Peppered with cranes, the city – or building site to be more accurate – lies one-and-a-half hour’s drive north of Jeddah between the Red Sea and scrubby desert. Its future depends on balancing the complex and evolving transport, health, education, housing and employment requirements of the city’s projected two million residents,” Smith writes.
King Abdullah Economic City.
Smith quotes Fahd Al-Rasheed, managing director of Emaar Economic City, who says the city is being built with the Kingdom’s 200,000 Saudi students studying abroad in mind. “Inevitably they are going to change things when they come back,” he said.
KAEC will also include a new port that aims to compete directly with Dubai, port manager Rayan Bukhari told the BBC.
“Freight arriving at the port will be taken directly to the capital via the new land bridge,” he explains, “At the moment lots of products destined for Riyadh are shipped to Dubai, but that will change. They’ll be shipped here as it is cheaper – and can be delivered more quickly within the Kingdom.”
[Click here to read the full article on the BBC by Sylvia Smith]
