LSaudi Arabia announced on Sunday the opening of Sindalah, a luxury resort on the Red Sea, the first project in the futuristic megacity Neom to see the light of day, despite lingering doubts about the viability of the megaproject.
“Neom is committed to supporting a new era of luxury tourism in the kingdom,” announced its director, Nadhmi al-Nasr in a press release. “Neom’s first destination offers visitors a ‘first look’ at what the future holds for our extensive destination and development portfolio,” he added.
The island of Sindalah, intended to attract high-end tourism, including a marina planned to accommodate a flotilla of yachts, covers 840,000 square meters and will be able to welcome up to 2,400 visitors per day by 2028, specifies the press release.
The Neom megaproject, led by the crown prince and de facto ruler of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Salman, is best known for its centerpiece, The Line, a building with two mirrored facades planned to extend 170 kilometers to across the desert from the Gulf of Aqaba.
By unveiling The Line in 2022, Prince bin Salman announced that it would house more than a million inhabitants in 2030, and nine million in 2045.
But the developers have revised their ambitions to 300,000 inhabitants and 2.4 kilometers of the project built by the end of the decade, according to the Bloomberg agency.
The project is being carried out in parallel with other major projects as part of “Vision 2030”, intended to ensure the development of the world’s leading crude exporting country in a potential oil-free future.
Saudi Arabia is the sole candidate for the organization of the Football World Cup in 2034, the award of which will be announced by Fifa in December.
