A 170km long skyscraper in Saudi Arabia may have to change because of birds

The Line skyscraper is part of Saudi Arabia's Neom project. This country wants to build a smart city stretching up to 170km.

 Impact on biodiversity

In 2016, Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman of Saudi Arabia announced the Vision 2030 Program, the goal of which is to transition the kingdom to a new economic development model.

The highlight of this program is the Neom project, divided into 4 areas including Sindalah, Trojena, Oxagon and The Line.

The Line is an ecological city, whose main structure is a skyscraper with impressive dimensions: 170km long, 200m wide and 500m high. Therefore, this unique city can accommodate a population of 9 million people.

The Line building has a mirror structure, 500 meters high and 170km long, so it can threaten migratory birds (Photo: SP).

Saudi Arabia communicates that The Line is a future city aiming for self-sufficiency with food growing facilities and high-speed transportation, even using 100% renewable energy sources.

However, this project is causing concern after the building comes into operation. It will have a negative impact on biodiversity: killing a significant number of bird species due to the design of the mirror structure.

This assertion comes from the US newspaper The Wall Street Journal, which explained in an article on May 7 that the agency had access to the project's internal documents and knew this information.

Changes may occur to the project

Neom Project planners themselves are said to be concerned about the location related to The Line project. In fact, its construction site is located on the migration route of billions of birds.

In other words, the building is like a 500 meter high mirror, which is definitely not a good thing for these animals.

However, The Line's Development Director, Denis Hickey, once expressed in a video that the project is an opportunity to create a better interaction model between the city and the landscape, nature and environment.

The future city of The Line has an estimated cost of $500 billion and those involved in this project will make the final decisions, mainly on the design of the building's mirrored facade.

There is currently no certainty as to whether the structure will undergo architectural modifications or not, construction work has already begun.

However, some media reported that Saudi Arabia may shorten the length of The Line project from 170km to 2.4km with 300,000 residents able to live in this city by 2030.