After Neom cut, Saudi Arabia expected to scale back more Vision 2030 plans

Analysts believe Saudi Arabia will continue to scale back its Vision 2030 commitments to preserve the health of the domestic economy, following reports last week that the kingdom is planning to downsize its near-term ambitions for the Neom gigaproject.

Citing sources familiar with the plans, Bloomberg reported on April 5 that the Saudi government had scaled back its medium-term ambition for the $1.5 trillion green megacity project in the middle of the desert, of which The Line is its most significant subproject. It had originally planned for 1.5 million residents to live in The Line but scaled back its ambitions to around 300,000. 

The ambitious plan was to build a 500-meter-tall (546 yards), mirrored, 170-kilometer-long (105 miles) line of parallel skyscrapers to form The Line, but the government has since scaled the distance back to just 2.4 kilometers (1.49 miles) long.

The project is part of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman's Vision 2030 agenda to diversify the economy away from a reliance on oil by the end of the decade by increasing investments in other sectors including artificial intelligence, digitization, clean energy and entertainment.