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The Jetsons Come To Saudi Arabia

Saudi Arabia’s crown prince wants to fill a barren stretch of desert with a Jetsons-style city-state of the future. The project, outlined in planning documents produced by a group of U.S. consultants, is so ambitious that it incorporates some technologies that don’t even exist yet.

1. Flying Taxis: Scientists might take a flying taxi to work. “Driving is just for fun, no longer for transportation (e.g. driving Ferrari next to the coast with a nice view),” planning documents show.

2. Cloud Seeding: The desert won’t always feel like the desert. “Cloud seeding” could make it rain.

3. Robot Maids: Don’t worry about household chores. While scientists are at work, their homes would be cleaned by robot maids.

4. State-of-the-Art Medical Facilities: Scientists would work on a project to modify the human genome to make people stronger.

5. World Class Restaurants: There would be fine dining galore in a city with the “highest rate of Michelin-starred restaurants per inhabitant.”

6. Dinosaur Robots: Residents could visit a Jurassic Park-style island of robot reptiles.

7. Glow-in-the-Dark Sand: The crown prince wants a beach that glows in the dark, like the face of a watch.

8. Alcohol: Alcohol is banned in the rest of Saudi Arabia. But it likely won’t be here, say people familiar with the plan.

9. Robot Martial Arts: Robots would do more than just clean your house. They also could spar head to head in a “robo-cage fight,” one of many sports on offer.

10. Security: Cameras, drones and facial-recognition technology are planned to track everyone at all times.

11. Moon: A giant artificial moon would light up each night. One proposal suggests it could live-stream images from outer space, acting as an iconic landmark.

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Engineered cities often work less well, much less well, than cities that have evolved slowly within dynamic societies.

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Originally posted by ShiroKuro:
I can actually access WSJ and most any other newspaper by going through my university's library website I'm just too lazy to perform that many clicks unless it's a piano ad.

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Originally posted by Axtremus:
Say, that "city-state of the future" wouldn't happen to also codify religious liberty, freedom of speech and the press, and equal rights for women, would it?