this post was submitted on 07 Nov 2025
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Chapotraphouse

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i-cant 50 billion already spent

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[–] Crucible@hexbear.net 84 points 1 month ago (3 children)

November 2024, 21,000 workers had been killed building Neom

I was trying to find the story of the old man they murdered because he didn't want to leave his tribal homelands. I believe they built the airport where his family had lived for generations

[–] godlessworm@hexbear.net 45 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (5 children)

wtf were they doing? using people’s foreheads as hammers? how do you possibly kill that many workers?

[–] CloutAtlas@hexbear.net 36 points 1 month ago

"So I read the Chinese have a famous great wall that has lasted centuries, I want Neom to be exactly like that"

"Sir, the laborers that died building it were entombed inside the wall and it was constructed on and off for 2500 years"

"Excellent. We'll do that"

[–] Belly_Beanis@hexbear.net 27 points 1 month ago

I'd guess lack of safety on job sites combined with overwork. Having people do 16+ hour days without hard hats or scaffolding is going to cause a lot of accidents.

[–] fox@hexbear.net 27 points 1 month ago

Yeah, it's such an absurdly high number I'm wondering if there isn't a yeonmi-park or zenz involved somewhere in the reporting.

[–] jackmaoist@hexbear.net 15 points 1 month ago

They use indentured slave labor so they probably don't care about safety.

Well you see, hierarchy in general and monarchy in particular are incredibly efficient.

[–] vegeta1@hexbear.net 35 points 1 month ago

Are you shitting me? That much more than even the death of migrant workers for the Qatar world cup

[–] Palacegalleryratio@hexbear.net 25 points 1 month ago

Yeah and the others sentenced to death for resisting eviction

[–] Robert_Kennedy_Jr@hexbear.net 70 points 1 month ago (5 children)

“When you flush the toilet, the stuff goes downhill, right?” the architect asked. “We’ve worked that out,” Qaddumi replied, according to the architect. “We’re going to have hundreds of shuttle cars running back and forth, picking up the sewage on retractable bridges.”

wtf

[–] OffSeasonPrincess@hexbear.net 33 points 1 month ago

Dubai style sewage system

[–] PorkrollPosadist@hexbear.net 25 points 1 month ago

Workers and Resources: Soviet Republic moment.

[–] ShimmeringKoi@hexbear.net 21 points 1 month ago (1 children)

??? Just make one poop train

[–] jackmaoist@hexbear.net 13 points 1 month ago

That would be Communism

[–] robotElder2@hexbear.net 16 points 1 month ago

:sans-doot When I was going up from town I met the turd train rolling down Every day hundred trains Every train hundred cars Every car hundred tons Every ton hundred tanks Every tank ten thousand Turds And every day smells even worse

[–] jack@hexbear.net 1 points 1 month ago

Damn, can't wait till we invent pipes

This was always the dumbest fucking thing I've ever heard of in my life and I'm still surprised they made it as far as they did into the construction. Just goes to show that if you show a whole bunch of relatively 'qualified' engineers/architects/scientists a pile of infinite money they will go along with whatever you say as long as you pay them.

[–] plinky@hexbear.net 50 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

the cruelty of the gulf states dictators is only rivaled by their gaudiness. (in case of saudis - a lack of foresight as well, uae and qatar are more competently evil)

(tfw oil at 60 and your cashflow gone to shits)

[–] kristina@hexbear.net 48 points 1 month ago (1 children)

dude played sims city once and thought that just one train going back and forth down an infinitely long city was peak

[–] keepcarrot@hexbear.net 17 points 1 month ago

Ok, look, Workers and Resources is actually a pretty hard game ok

[–] InevitableSwing@hexbear.net 43 points 1 month ago

I'm very disappointed. I hoped MBS would triple down and spend another $100 billion or whatever to claim they were building a space needle that would literally reach the moon.

[–] Wertheimer@hexbear.net 31 points 1 month ago

Line go down. stonks-down

[–] Monk3brain3@hexbear.net 24 points 1 month ago
[–] AfricanExpansionist@lemmy.ml 22 points 1 month ago

This is hilarious and predictable

[–] Awoo@hexbear.net 21 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (4 children)

They could've built a space elevator with the level of hubris this project had and it would've been more genuinely useful and just as much of a statement. They have an excellent location for it.

You can see it on google maps too, they've dug out 106km of foundations for it, some straight through actual mountains. What they've done is an environmental blight.

[–] Civility@hexbear.net 13 points 1 month ago (1 children)
[–] Awoo@hexbear.net 13 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Right? Plus if you build that thing nobody else is ever building one. The city that owns the space elevator will be one of the most important locations in the world eventually and putting it on the route through the most important trade corridor through the panama canal is a very good location even if it's not on the equator.

The best equatorial location for it is Singapore or near Macapa, Brazil though probably.

[–] Palacegalleryratio@hexbear.net 9 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Yeah, but a space elevator is beyond our current capabilities of materials science. Neom has the benefit of being physically buildable even if the end result isn’t desirable.

[–] rubber_chicken@hexbear.net 6 points 1 month ago

The oversized rectangular prism, sure, if you can get the materials in the quantities necessary. I'd be very surprised if any structural engineers said the chandelier idea was feasible without being paid a lot of money to say exactly that.

[–] egg1918@hexbear.net 5 points 1 month ago

Picking up my coffee at Starbucks Neom Community-1, anyone want anything?

[–] ConcreteHalloween@hexbear.net 21 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Did anyone expect otherwise? Even the Saudis?

[–] CrawlMarks@hexbear.net 16 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I kinda expected to build like a visor center and a tramstop not connected to anything.

[–] ConcreteHalloween@hexbear.net 13 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I sometimes wonder why the Gulf States just don't build a giant flaming Mammon head to throw their excess wealth in, it's probably a easier way to eat up all that dead capital than planning all these bullshit mega projects.

[–] CrawlMarks@hexbear.net 12 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

I mean, I kinda assume none if that money is like, actually real. All just spreadhseet stuff they hypothetically have but can't really spend, but investing it and hiding losses still works out.

I am with it though. A world where we have cool bullshit megaprojects is a better world than we have.

[–] grandepequeno@hexbear.net 18 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Communism would've been able to do this

[–] NuraShiny@hexbear.net 25 points 1 month ago (2 children)

But would have been too smart to try.

[–] theturtlemoves@hexbear.net 8 points 1 month ago (1 children)
[–] NuraShiny@hexbear.net 6 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Last I checked, that's a town and not a line of houses in the desert. Are you really trying to draw an equivalent between planning and building a new town vs whatever the fuck the Line is?

[–] theturtlemoves@hexbear.net 9 points 1 month ago

It was initially designed as a linear city. It wasn't as dumb as the Line, but still a weird idea.

[–] FnordPrefect@hexbear.net 16 points 1 month ago

kelly The Great Fail of Arabia

[–] john_brown@hexbear.net 14 points 1 month ago
[–] UmbraVivi@hexbear.net 13 points 1 month ago

MBS is such a fucking idiot.

[–] Kopfrkingl@hexbear.net 10 points 1 month ago

What was the grand idea anyway? A stupid bawdy city that vapid people will visit? They already have those, this always seemed like an utter waste of time.