With drone footage showing construction beginning on Saudi Arabia’s half-trillion dollar megaproject called The Line, it’s useful to ask what’s going on in the desert. Stretching over 100 miles inland from the Red Sea, the mirrored, car-less, low-carbon project begs whether the repressive regime is greenwashing its image. Tomorrow’s Build has a breakdown of the project’s promises and expectations, as well as some history on previous linear arcologies.
Ray Dubicki is a stay-at-home dad and parent-on-call for taking care of general school and neighborhood tasks around Ballard. This lets him see how urbanism works (or doesn’t) during the hours most people are locked in their office. He is an attorney and urbanist by training, with soup-to-nuts planning experience from code enforcement to university development to writing zoning ordinances. He enjoys using PowerPoint, but only because it’s no longer a weekly obligation.