Some of the World's Most Useless Megaprojects
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 11 มี.ค. 2023
- Discover the dark side of megaprojects in this eye-opening video. From the failed Berlin BER Airport to the questionable practicality of The Line, explore the shocking truths behind these costly endeavors.
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The Line's creator must have been inspired by a white line he saw on the desk before it got snorted
That one cracked me up! 🤣
Nice job sir, you made my day.😊
A line from nowhere to nowhere
Its almost poetic😂
LOL!
Lmaoo
I happened to read this comment at exactly 0:14 into the video and I gotta say... sometimes things just work out.
The Line is what happens when an out of touch with reality wealthy person is surrounded by people who are too scared to say “NO”!!!
whole country's like that, we suffer from bad ideas but we fool ourselves into thinking that it's somehow good
Actually they aren't afraid to say no but they are more eager to say yes because it's the best time to swindle money from the rich idiots
Saudi arabia is so fked if oil income ever dries up
@2Phast4Rocket no, they all say "yes" otherwise they'll be executed.
They should turn those ghost cities into massive paintball ranges with 500 players each team
While the idea is sound, the 'quality' of those buildings means that paintballs could eventually displace enough 'concrete' to make one of them collapse.
Real life (non-lethal) PUBG!
more like 5000 players each team
As a german who travels on a regular basis with trains, I can say that the trains here in Germany can do literally anything. But being on time is unfortunately not one of those things.
Genau das selbe dachte ich auch gerade 😂
I don't think trains run on time anywhere in the world, except Japan
@@oldtimegames96pretty much, Japan is really good at its trains though. First time I visited I was warned to not get on the train if it’s 1 minute early because that’s likely the wrong train. True enough, their trains are usually exactly on time.
The spectacularly convoluted semi-privatization in the 1990s, which constitutionally (!) prioritized freight trains over passenger trains, ruined it. Ever since then, Germany's pathetic train schedules have been a running joke in German-language media, but somehow, the stereotype of German "clockwork efficiency" is keeping alive a myth of German trains being on time. For the average US guy, who never steps a foot outside his country, let alone continent, that may be understandable. But Simon lives in Prague; how can he not be aware that the neighbor to the west might have better roads, but sucks spectacularly at trains?
@oldtimegames96 That isn't 100% a good thing, though. There've been multiple cases that made it to court (each with testimonies indicating it's a common practice countless others have been subjected to) about train drivers, who narrowly missed the timetable due to factors outside their control, and got sent to "retrain" at JR facilities, which consisted of getting shouted at that they had failed the company, while either stuck doing nothing, but think about "what they've done", in a seminar room or being made to do janitorial tasks. For weeks, even months. Obviously, this leads to tremendous stress during this "training" as well as on the job for literally zero real world benefit, which in turn leads to burnout, suicide, and dangerous speeding in densely populated areas to catch up when held up. AFAIK the (overall thankfully still relatively few) train derailments in Japan can all be traced back to this. Granted, the last case I read about was some years ago, but given general resistence to all sorts of work environment improvements in Japan, I've precious little hope that this no longer happens. Even in Japan most kinds of mental and physical abuse of employees (and students) have been illegal for decades now, ever since lawmakers recognized they had an extraordinarily high rate of suicide as well as of people literally working themselves to death. But all the JR companies are powerful (and I wouldn't be surprised to hear of such at other train lines as well), and in the end the whistleblowers are the ones that get ostracized by their (ex-)coworkers.
Having lived in Saudi Arabia the notion that 'access to the sun' is a priority is astonishing, most of the year you really want shade.
the slaves on the lower floors will get plenty of shade alright... both physically and metaphorically.
I live in Saudi Arabia.
@@user-on7eu2eo8u would you call 'access to the sun' a priority?
It's almost like all their money wasn't earned via critical thinking lol
@@rustythecrown9317we would shade the whole goddamn country if we could.
#fuckthesun
Nice to see the line being called out. It's amazing how many channels still talk about it as if it's a viable thing that totally might happen.
It might happen, just on a much smaller scale. I agree its a stupid idea, though.
It is happening. Right now. I live in the UAE and the stupid line is making things really tight for the builders here as all the contractors are moving their staff to the Line because the Saudis are spending whatever they have to in order to get people there
@@randomuser6306happining and finishing are 2 diefferent things
The Saudis never finished that 1km tower they wanted to build 10 YEARS AGO.
@@ghaznavidnah they will Abondend it half way in and scratch it from memory with propaganda.
Just like that 1km tower they wanted to build 10 YEARS ago..... Yeah.
"A city halfway between nowhere and nowhere else"
Beautiful.
Another problem with the Line is that in the desert, one side would gradually accumulate sand dunes. They might be able to get around it by having gaps in the lower levels every so often but even then, there would be huge effort needed to get the sand from one side to the other, or to move it elsewhere.
Agree, I watched the presentation at WEF. My first thought was this not been thought through, blowing sand, prevailing winds, animal migration, accumulation of debris...
Good point. I want to see a deep dive dove could spend hours picking the line apart
My thoughts, exactly. Wide space in the lower level would, also, offer possible passageways for wildlife.
They can't even get toilets to function after placing a giant glass peen in the desert.
People don't realise that The Line is about politics.
Saudi Arabia have big plans for the region of Neom with land acquisition in the region beginning back in 2017. The plans includes a large shipping hub, airport and ski resorts as well as a major city, luxury hotels and a world renowned marina.
Much of this land is claimed by an ethnic group called al-Huwaytat. The original deal for Neom was for the tribe to be compensated and only the land needed for the first stages of development to be handed over allowing the developers and the al-Huwaytat to benefit from the growth of Neom. However this deal stalled out as the tribe began being forcibly evicted from these lands as to make way for an ever increasing list of developments including new agricultural projects.
Things came to ahead in 2020 with major protests, The government declared these protests illegal and launched a major security crackdown, many of al-Huwaytat leaders were arrested and charged and the most vocal opponent of the evictions was killed in a confrontation with police. Police in the region tasked with evicting people reportedly appealed to the government for help as they were being assaulted and even shot at whilst attempting to relocating tribe members and construction work was impossible due to the unrest.
In 2021 the line was announced and became part of Neom project coincidentally it went right through the heart of the tribes many town in the area. Authorities announced it would force the entire tribes removal from the region, military personnel were dispatched to help relocate the tribe and peace was restored in a matter of weeks.
The line will probably never be built and it's funding will be folded into the rest of the Neom development project.
BER is just hillarious... From Indoor Lights on 300.000 square meters they could not turn off due to a missing Light control system to the fact that they had to open and close all water Taps and Windows once a day, to prevent mold or that they simply forgot the power lines for automatic doors... They even hat an empty train driving though the train station every Day to create some air to avoid rust and mold. You could do a 1 hour video about BER alone and couldn´t cover everything that went wrong..
We're having a good chuckle in Massachusetts over a school. Minnechaug Regional High School. Lights had been on 24/7 for a year and a half. Still not sure if they fixed it. Nobody could figure out how to turn off the system.
And it isn't even the only stupid airport in Germany - there's also Kassel.
He did a Brain Blaze video on it, back when it was Business Blaze.
They also had to change all the monitors in the Airport once, since the original ones where so old that they wouldn't get through modern regulations
We germans arent always smart, usually the berliners are the type to louse such an easy thing up.
First trip into the Whistlerverse today. The Lizard Overlords are pleased. Allegedly.
Perfection! Heard it in Simon's voice 🤣😎
Into the Whistlerverse.
Whistlerverse of Madness...
Whistlerversal Soldier
Imbecilic and sad, no wonder she left you.
Biggest problem with cities like the line is that the people who decide for it to be built have never actually used public transit or habe any idea of what works and what doesn't. Therefore when city planners show their plans in the planning competition, often the one with the simplest explanations and flashiest graphics gets the job.
That’s not even factoring all of their other ambitious projects they have planned for that part of the country. Projects that require untested/completely nonexistent technology.
At the end of the day, this whole project will be nothing more than an ecological disaster.
@@troybaxter How I wish all those huge oil reserves were found in, say, the Benelux countries, and not in a backwards hellhole like Saudi Arabia. Now the money is spent on golden Lamborghinis and the most moronic projects the world has ever seen.
@@troybaxter well its being built anyways and construction is going full steam ahead.
though latest disaster of the american bank collapsing after the crown prince invested 10 billion of public funds in it while ignoring hes advisors begging him otherwise(same ones that approved the line) have put hes projects into questions as public support have nose dived this past months.
@@Jack-he8jv it may have gone underway, but it definitely won’t succeed…
@@Jack-he8jv His majesty can do no wrong. His vision shall be realized and his city will cleave his kingdom into two beautiful slices like Zulphicar cutting a cake. His coffers will never be empty so his project will come to fruition.
As someone born and raised in Berlin, the second I heard it's a mega project I started smiling, knowing it's the BER. A family friend once was part of the execution of the plans. Well one of the many I should say. He revealed to us that one of the reasons for the overly huge budget and the lack of understanding what the Frick was going on was the fact, that most small companies that worked on the project had to give up midway, meaning Berlin would get the next company to continue the job, they quit shortly after too, new company in and so and so forth for almost every department of plan execution. Imagine a soup cooked by a chef, but so far the chef only got to cut a carrot. The next chef comes in, sees "cut the carrots" and continues that. Easy at the beginning. But once you get to the end of cutting carrots, another chef decides to cut another veggie. In the end you get a bunch of random cut stuff, mixed together, more chefs come and go and throw in stuff without ever tasting it. While in the process those guys get to redo this whole process multiple times. And now consider this just to be for example the guys that do pipework for water. In the end you got companies with like 5 workers, supposed to be laying wires for an entire Airport. Impossible task, so they hired different companies for the same task, that might not use the same techniques. And in the end you get that suprise menu that includes a bowl of soup and 400 other dishes, all together called BER🤣
Great analogy 😂
Yeah, and this was a political problem. Well, we talk about Berlin after all...
Parts of the family work/worked for big construction companies that build these kind of things and they could only shake their heads about the crap Berlin was doing. If they gave the project to just one capable company it would have been finished 10 years ago and with way lower cost, but the politicians in Berlin really wanted to bring in shittons of small companies that all did their own stuff and in the end nothing worked together. Really well done.
Are you aware of 'pass it on' on the Sorted Food channel? That's exactly what you're describing :)
My analogy would be more like: find someone offering the cheapest price with total disregard of their skills and keep replacing them with the next cheapest one until the end of Berlin or Germany or time itself. Repeat in Stuttgart.
Back in 2012 I loved these postcards with Walter Ullbricht saying: 'Niemand hat die Absicht eine Flughafen zu errichten'
(Nobody has the prospect to build an airport, a joke on the original sentence on the Berlin's Wall)
Yeah, I go to Berlin every now and then. I remember seeing BER on the map for several years, but the flights always went to Tegel. I asked my cousin (native Berliner) about it and he just shook his head. Now I have flown home from there once and it was not great. By contrast Tegel is a pretty great and easily accessible airport.
One of the root causes of the German BER disaster was that the mayor of Berlin at the time (whose specialty was mostly celebrating parties) decided to build the airport without a general contractor. It was the Dunning-Kruger effect in full swing. The guy had no idea how to construct an airport (or how to do anything else for that matter) and therefore figured it can't be too difficult and that it would save a few million in profits that a general contractor to organise the thousands of sub-contractors otherwise would charge…
"it would save a few million in profits that a general contractor to organise the thousands of sub-contractors otherwise would charge…"
Ouch...Oh, well, it was other people's money, so no big deal, right?
Save a 'few million' by not hiring a general contractor...good.
Spend a few billion because not hiring a general contractor fucked things up...oh well, these things happen, right?
OH hell yeah!!
That was the man himself who didn´t even manage to match his left and right shoe, was he?
Concerning the BER Airport: it isn’t exactly useless as Berlin and the region has no other airport anymore as Tempelhof, Tegel and the old airport in Schönefeld were closed because of it. They all were too old and Tempelhof and Tegel were located inside the city which isn’t really were you want an airport nowadays. The decision for the BER to be built at this location was mainly because politicians wanting it so but also because there was already an airport in the direct vicinity and all other locations were far more remote. But if I as a Berlin citizen can tell you one thing: the BER was just nerve wracking as there were times in which every single week new stories emerged what they had found now to be not working. Many people really didn’t believe that it would open one day. But it did and is now working quite good. It is however way too big but at the same time too small for the passenger numbers because of some of the reasons you mentioned.
Oh and by the way: German trains are on time? 😂 I’m sorry, but not even 70% of our Intercity and Intercity Express trains were on time last year. And on time is by definition less than 6 minutes too late. So, punctual German trains is really just a myth anymore.
Oh and let's not forget the fact that a broken down train isn't technically late per the german rail company...
Wow. Compared to the trains here in America, you're still better than we are. But c'mon guys, German precision is what you're famous for. That and Hitler. Of these two things, if you lose your amazing precision, then you're down to only...well, you get the point.
Some correction: The Schönefeld airport was not just in the vicinity, BER was basically built on top of Schönefeld airport.
There used to be two runways south of the old building (the now retired terminal 5), too close to each other for parallel operation. The northern one war demolished, the southern one was rebuilt.
To the south of that the new airport building was constructed partially on the location of the old hangars (the historic Henschel aircraft factory was preserved) and on additional land for which Diepensee was demolished.
South of the new building they added a new runway fit for A380 planes (which come only every two years for the ILA air show…).
My family and friends had the running joke for years, how I would graduate before Ber gets done, how Id become 18, than 20, and so much more. Worsed part is, that we sadly were right for far to long
Statistically speaking any country that has its railways always running on time will be at war within 2 years. Ask any Italian.
My favourite thing about "The Line", is that due to the life span of modern concrete (being 100 years), within 100 years of completion, every single inhabitant would become homeless, all at once.
Millions of people, made instantly homeless, in an environment which is totally hostile to human habitation.
Why talking such NONSESE ???
@@crocodile3736 just observing reality.
Besides it will be the human equivalent of the Mouse Paradise experiment, that's something you can Google for yourself.
I love the way ‘clever’ planners say we should live in cities of their design and be very grateful - but people like me who perhaps are not as clever want to live in real places with hearts and souls, not concrete edifices to celebrate someone’s ‘genius’
The Line will revolutionize making any two points in a city as far apart as possible!
meh, any city in rush hour would be far worse (time wise) to traverse due to car centric development.
I think there is an error in the BER video. Simon states that due to Covid 19 it opened in 2012. That's 8 years before the pandemic.
Anyway if you want a story better than BER) to South Africa and the Medupi and Kusile power stations. They went about 10 times over budget and almost a decade over time. And still suffer regular outages.
Yuppers! Noticed that too! These videos are getting increasingly hyperbolic and desperate for views...
Yeah, I was like, Ummmm. Say what?
@@stickynorth Next you'll tell me Starbucks is desperate to sell coffee
2021
Assuming he ment 2022 but yeah i caught that too
The Line project is the fever dream of someone who never heard "No" in his entire life. Someone who is used that if he throws enough money at something, it will get done. The whole NEOM project is getting out of hand. They're planing a NEOm airport too, last I heard, different sub-projects that are as much a fever dream as The Line. Just the briefs from the contractor regarding any NEOM project is like reading a fairy tale that an overly rich person wants to build in reality. It's not just the wildlife that is getting a bad hand in this, there are also at least one tribe that live there and were forcefully relocated, isn't'it? I believe some of the more fierce tribespeople who opposed the relocation were even executed. It's pure dystopia at this point.
I'm not surprised that no one has moved to these ghost cities. A friend who from Cambodia and is of Chinese descent asked why I had moved the country. She said "only poor people live in the country". So I think that mind set would be a problem added to all those you spoke of.
I can see Prince Salman saying one night as he was contemplating whatever it is he contemplates: Y'now what would be really cool?
Sycophant 1 responds: what's that your majesty?
Prince Salman: a long and straight city through the desert.
City Engineer: ummmm...
Sycophant 2: OMG, what a great idea!
Prince Salman: get it done.
Sycophant 1: yes sir, right away sir. Brilliant idea as usual...☺
He is a failure before the crown is even on his head. Neom, the Line, Mukaab (huge cube building building) and Qiddaya (Six Flags amusement park in desert)
🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️
@@paul_321 He definitely radiates no-dick energy.
he probably laid a "Line" to many and got into ideas.
*snorts another mountain of coke
Dont wanna be that guy but he's Mohammed, his dad is King Salman, hence Mohamed bin Salman literally "Mohammed Salmanson"
The thing I can't overcome with the idea of The Line is. It's getting built on sand, and it's getting built surrounded by sand. Surely any cross wind will lead to sand building up on one side and eventually swamping it?
nobody said the arabs were smart... just rich... more dollars than sense.
That is not how sand works.... During colonial times there were cities in Namibia, now covered in sand, but not when they were occupied.
They need to sweep it every now and then, along with corpses of migrant birds, I suppose.
@@phoenix5054 and the corpses of the poor from below.
@@mikatu The buildings in Namibia are not 170 meters long, let alone 170 _kilometers_ long. It's like comparing your front door to the Berlin Wall.
Walking through "Ghost" developments is one of the more unique experiences I've had. Everyone I visited them with experienced them differently. They look great from the street. But not until you're inside the empty lanes do you get the real scope. One near my village a person had the brilliant idea of planting sunflowers in the common open spaces, so that people visited for sunny photo ops...and a genuine sense of dystopian melancholy.
The idea was the population would keep booming
Simon's slightly sadistic glee in reporting these MegaDisasters is kind of infectious.
The Chinese ghost cities may be worse than you described... Some of them are not even functional - no plumbing or wiring. They were built to absorb savings, not to be lived in.
Yup, investment properties. Its the norm in China tho that new builds are sold as a shell. Its up the the buyer to do services. He was wrong about central planning. Its the total opposite. Build build build, sell sell sell. No thought on where the ppl will work etc. And the guv let it go on cos the construction inflates the GDP. Where I live, 3 traditional towns totally demolished, being replaced with high rises. Thriving communities hundreds of years old, gone.
@@TheScotsalan It's not about installing plumbing or wiring, as a huge percentage of the buildings cannot be lived in, ever. The concrete has the strength of styrofoam, because... why bother?
@@VideoDotGoogleDotComand even if they are populated, a 1.0 earthquake would make em topple like dominoes
After working in planning & zoning for the better part of a decade, I can say with confidence that city engineers, urbanists, and architects aren't people whose opinions are to be trusted on much of anything.
Preach. I worked for the county of Los Angeles for a loooong time. Not a day went by where some stupidity didn't flabbergast me. I mean actual, real, literal shock. The rest of the world has to be the same or worse.
You strike me as a bitter dumba**.
@@IrishMike22 please make my day with the best story that comes to mind. I'll give you Internet points.
@@IrishMike22 thank you for your work, citizen. 👍 glad you've found your way to greener pastures.
@@IrishMike22 no hate. Just a bit disapointed
Other suggestions. Here in Montreal, we have plenty of those similar to the Berlin airport: 2 hospitals that are taking forever to build, the '76 Olympic Stadium, highways, metro line expansions, bridges and more. Not useless because they are needed, but taking forever to build, going way, way over budgets, a scent of corruption and politicians lacking courage and putting their reelections before the people's needs.
You are forgetting the biggest similarity with BER, Mirabel International Airport. 45 minutes north of Montréal, mass farms and houses expropriations, exceeding costs. All of that for nothing.
The Karolinska hospital in Stockholm, Sweden is the same. Took much longer, got more expensive, and even turned out smaller than before so we now have too few hospital beds.
There was another Karolinska hospital built in the '70s where they went the other way and built a huge hospital south of the city - turned out well, but they didn't finish the infrastructure so there was no way to get there for a couple of years...
Montreal seems to be good at this for some reason.
The Line is something I would draw up if I was working as an enviroment artist on a sci fi movie or game and was told "make a cool looking city". I can see this being an awesome backdrop for a chase scene or whatever, but actually living there would be horrendous.
The most mindblowing thing is that they actually seem to have started working on that braindead idea of a line city. Reality writes the best satire.
I felt like "The Line" was the stupidest idea ever... now i know im not alone
Regarding the Line, to provide all the supplies, necessary for a whole city will require a massive receiving and distribution area outside of The Line. You need a shipping and receiving area that cannot be housed efficiently in the building so there will be an overflow complex that will destroy the look of a clean line building. There will be other problems like needed expansions in any one section that cannot because it's locked in on both sides
Try to imagine the logistical nightmare of just in time deliveries.
"Oops, a ship had good seas and arrived early, and oops another ship arrived late."
Where do you place all those warehouses?
The simplest reason why a linear city would be inefficient is something the video completely fails to adress: By stretching the city, you reduce the interior square footage relative to the circumference. You take a tiny mouse for instance: It's metabolism is very high, and it is constantly cold (notice the constant agitation to keep warm), because its skin surface is still comparatively large relative to its minuscule heat-generating interior volume. Stray away from a round shape, and you reduce the volume compared to the surface, just like a change in size would do. A stick-like city involves the same loss in ratio between the delineation size and the interior square footage. If you were to abruptly shrink your body down to 1/10 its size, you would immediately feel colder, for similar reasons, but this time only due to scale, not shape. Yes a linear city could work, it would just have a very small population compared to its infrastructure, even if you tried to compensate by raising the number of floors vertically. Focusing on the lack of redundancy fails to adress this far more basic and educational point. In fact, the lack of redundancy in failure points is the least of the concept's problems.
I agree, the lack of redundancy is the least of the projects concerns, but the fact that such a major issue is the least significant issue here is alarming.
Don't forget that the Line would absolutely destroy the ecosystem it's built upon. With no way for anything to cross from one side to another, it would effectively create two completely different ecosystems on either side, with, at the very least, unpredictable results, if not the outright extinction of several species of plants and animals.
Yeah he said that.😊
Since when have the Saudis given a shit about ecosystems?
@@godamid4889 Or logic, or their subjects, or human rights, or laws, or morals.
Actually, the list of things they do care about likely consists entirely of themselves and their money.
@@Darca1n well said.
Or they would put "animal tunnels" under them like they do for highways
The location for the BER was actually one of the few good ideas in the project. You mention that there „was already a village there“, but more importantly, there was already an airport there as well. The Berlin Schönefeld Airport had previously been used primarily by low-cost carriers, and the idea was that rather than building an all new airport they would just enlarge the existing one. Add more runways, additional terminals, let the low-cost carriers keep their infrastructure and bob's your uncle.
Failing to mention this really crucial fact questions the credibility of this channel in general.
Great idea, but as pointed out, it, um, didn't work out that well. An airport that can't take night traffic is kind of a huge problem, innit?
@@Melody_Raventressit’s not uncommon for airports in Europe to not permit or heavily restrict night flights.
E.g. London Heathrow, Gatwick and Stanstead Airports all have a quota system for the amount of noise permitted at night (2300-0700) - i.e. you can have a couple of noisy flights or a lot of quieter ones.
Many German airports, e.g. Frankfurt and Cologne have a ban on night flights (2300/0000 to 0500)
Amsterdam Schiphol limits night flights to approximately 80 a day.
@@Melody_Raventress all the old inner-city airports were closed at night and the restrictions would have tightened in the future. The main driver for Schönefeld instead of a remote location was so there is no need for a second airport nearer the city. If you really need night operations there is still Leipzig airport. In the end it’s always the question of how much money the state should spend on airports. There isn’t a huge demand for night operations outside of hubs.
so they destroyed the old airport and made it not used anymore such a great idea!
You havent mentioned one of the funnies facts about BER. In the late 2010s there was actually a, not at all disregarded, proposal for tearing the whole thing down and building it entirely new from the ground because everything was built that badly regarding the fire safety and technical installations and it would be cheaper to rebuild the entire structure, although completely finished!, than to refit it. They didn't do that of corse and it eventually opened, but it took a while and cost a fortune...
Just imagine arriving at the airport of Line City...
- What's this line on that billboard over there?
- It's the map.
Finally someone calls The Line what it actually is.
Doers do, while everyone else talks and talks from a distance.
Let them build it. Am sure they have the brain power to build a building! ... That's what it is, a huge building.
1967 the USS Forestal caught on fire. It had a single water line running down the center of the vessel to fight fires with. This line was broken in the fire which made it impossible to get water from one end of the ship to the other. Neom will be even worse.
Finally, someone's making sense of the Arabian project. I've been telling people that this mega city would be nothing but a mega toaster without avail.
Honestly, as much as the construction phase of the BER was a joke here in Berlin, now that its open and running its pretty great and very well connected to the rest of the city. Maybe the price tag was too high for just an airport but its a huge improvement on the two tiny and ancient airports we used to have and it will serve Berlin and the surrounding area well basically forever so it not really a useless megaproject.
I am SO glad I saw your comment. I was going to be on my way thinking BER would just accumulate weeds. If YOU have this to say, there must surely be others. Good!
The line is what happens when you've got more money than sense
More dollars than sense.
@@motchi2667 probably found the money down the back of a sofa
What's going to become of them? They are already demolishing most of the high rise buildings because they are unsafe. Half built is an extremely kind description. The buildings were constructed but little to nothing was installed, plumbing, electrical, elevators, windows, doors, and just enough stairs that people could theoretically walk up to the various floors. Some flats have no access at all, i.e. they cannot be entered because there is no door way to the flat.
I'm guessing that it was because the planners either ran out of money, or that the flat would collapse if a door was installed
You should of shown some of the tofu dreg stuff. I saw one from a guy who woke up to a load noise. He looked out his apartment to find the whole staircase had collapsed. He lived on the tenth floor. He still live there because he couldn't afford a new place. He left via the fire escape, his neighbors that is. He had to get to it by climging to a widow sil and shimying to it.
I guess it's the fact that I'm playing Final Fantasy 7 right now, but "The Line" sounds a fair bit like a real life version of Midgar. Poor live on the bottom, the rich live on top of them (the slums and those on top of the plate), surrounding environment and wildlife would suffer. I guess the only difference would be not being powered by eight reactors and not built in a circular fashion.
Even then, Midgar would work better irl than the line
The guy at 3:50 is not Alfredo di Mauro, that is former German head of state Joachim Gauck.
😂 i am not only one noticing
the first story reminds me of the "Millennium Road" in a town near my home village, supposed to be finished to celebrate the year 2000. I was born in 1998 - I grew up, went through primary and secondary education, and was near graduation from university when it was completed a few years ago. It's also a *very* short road, it can't be more than a quarter of a mile long. Lol.
Now that Berlin Airport is complete, I actually like it. When I got there, everyone who got off the plane had their luggage already waiting for them once they cleared immigration.
I love the energy he displays throughout the video! Great job and keep it up man!
also worth mentioning is all those new empty buildings were made incredibly poorly and likely literally started to falling apart as soon as construction was completed, due to the very poor quality of the current construction practices in china (look up tofu-derg construction for videos on this).
Tofu - Dreg vid th-cam.com/video/s-2DtL-Wjkc/w-d-xo.html weak af steel ffs
''very poor quality '' sums up ALL of china since the late 40's.
Not all. Their biggest problem is still the population. However, I believe the media is blowing it out of proportion. In China property ownership is a big thing nowadays - having a flat or a house you don't even live in is considered an investment. Also, one of the most famous 'ghost cities' - Ordos Kangbashi - has actually gained a substantial amount of citizens over time. So, not a total failure but a weird thing nonetheless.
it is chinese construction! of course it isn't good. In Angola they built a hospital that never opened because it was unsafe for anyone to stand inside. Every single country that bought the myth of the chinese high speed rail cancelled their orders because it is not safe for them. chinese quality is famous all over the world but not in a good way.
@@Drak_Thedpproblem is not population, due to one child policy there will be more older people than young soon, that’s trouble.
Younger people are willing to immigrate to US/west we will have to see how this works out for China.
The linear city is so interesting, but I had thought of the vulnerability if there was a fire, and it would shut down all transportation. It just wouldn't work for that climate either or location, and no sewer system would be so bad.
Maybe they'd have a dedicated army of sewage trucks like Burj Khalifa...
Yeah, proponents of the Line simply cannot comprehend just how stupid of an idea this is. It doesn’t take a fucking genius to see how easy it would be for everything to fail. We can focus on the issues with transportation, as it is the most glaring, but like Simon said, electricity, water, and sewage are all one major event away from total catastrophe. And if you think that can’t happen, then you have not been around the type of equipment that goes into electricity, water, or sewage. It would literally be an engineer’s worst nightmare.
@@troybaxter you know its not like they are limited to 1 cable for electricity or 1 pipe for sewerage, they can have multiple ones that can be used for redundancy across various levels of the underground or going on either side of the line.
@@Jack-he8jv you still miss the point. It is easy to destroy all those networks on a single line. It is hard to do so through a 2D mesh network.
And again, you still have a very limited amount of space for substations, water lines, sewage lines, etc. Not enough to have substantial enough redundancy to prevent failure.
One thing no one has mentioned is comparing it to the first Total Recall. When they were looking for someone they just cut of oxygen in that section.
With this they can lock you in, block the sun, stop the air conditioning letting you cook. It sounds crazy but I’d bet they’re looking into it.
I kinda wanna see the Line City built to watch the disaster that ensues. From a safe distance.
Although I'd be curious to see who would also migrate there.
many people would, its headed by a committee of international advisors with various specializations so the issues raised against it are most likely already accounted for, on top of that is the fact that it would be the most walk-able city on earth.
@@Jack-he8jv its a city the shape of line dozens upon dozens of km long. do you just lack common sense?
Yes and it will bankrupt Saudi Arabia as well. Excellent. 😅
As a Berlin Corridor pilot, I got to fly in to Templehof a couple of times in 1977, between the apartment buildings. Obviously, a new airport was needed even then, and Tegel couldn't cut it. A city, once divided, takes a long, long time to heal.
Mind expanding on the apartment building part? Not sure what you mean but I’m interested!
@@max1999_ Tempelhof Airport was located in the middle of the city, literally in the middle of apartment buildings. Simply go to the English Wikipedia article "Berlin Tempelhof Airport". There's a picture that will make you understand immediately. 😂
@@pepsi-mcrib holy shit you’re right hahaha. I thought you meant that they flew between two apartment buildings on approach. But it’s literally surrounded on all sides. Thanks for the quick lesson haha
If anyone wants to compliment german engineering, point them at the BER airport.
The problem with BER is that there was no general contractor to run the show (like any sane project would have) and the politicians overseeing the whole shit-show had little to no experience in keeping hundreds of subcontractors organized. Lesson: Sometimes you really need the middle man and pay him accordingly.
BER really is the antitheses of how overrated German engineering is. As someone that works with German software and technology daily (and I do mean daily, as in 6-7 times a week), I can truly attest to this fact.
They've already started construction of The Line... I can't wait for urban explorers to get a chance to explore it in 10 years. It's going to be an amazing ghost city.
The BER is truly a wonder of bad planning. I made a presentation on it in Highschool. Then again during my studies, in a course about planning, as an example of what not to do. 😂
You know something is absolute raving stupidity when Simon starts dropping f bombs on his videos. I can tell you when engineers in my office first heard about the line, they had the same reaction.
One fascinating design detail about the BER airport: Totally different from any modern airport it has gates where the departing and arriving passengers are not separated in any way. Boarding and leaving a plane is akin to entering or leaving a very crowded bus during rish hour.
Also the layout of the main floor was not taking into account the larger modern security check stations so they had two add two additional structures to the sides of the main hall. So you can not go straight through the hall to get to the gates. Which may be a good thing since the baggage checkpoints are placed right in the middle of the hall so passengers with baggage would block the access to the gates in any case if you had not to take a wide detour to the left or right to get to the security check…
What ? Does that mean someone arriving could just hop onto another plane ? Stowaway style ?
@@TheScotsalan No, that not, there still is the checkpoint for the boarding passengers. But the exiting passengers are basically routed right into those who wait for the next boarding and there is insufficient space for waiting at the gates so this creates a mess.
It feels like an early 1970s stlye airport for a smaller city not like the newly built airport for the capitol of Germany.
@@guidokorber2866 Ahh right. I recall singapore had a similar setup. I need to check 👍
Singapore does have that setup.
@@guidokorber2866 in zürich the system is the same and it works, sorry
The great thing about the line project is that every single person will live no more than a few 100 meters from several train lines including high speed. That is never going to get old.
Projects like the new Berlin Airport BER teach us an important Lesson: to keep Politicians as far away from any Construction-Side as even possible. They will turn anything in a Vanity-Project for their own Ego and we can be pretty sure that at least 99.5% of those Politicians don´t have any clue from Construction and what is nessecary.
As if a gallopping Burocracie isn´t terrible enough on it´s own.
and by the way: good Joke about Trains always on Time and other Fairy Tales.
A sister channel describing how the main channel is sometimes useless.
Brilliant.
5:04 it's incredible that this airport construction was so poorly managed that it got delayed by covid a whole 8 years before the rest of the world did lol
Do I smell time travel shenanigans here?😁
@@DarkZodiacZZ if this was Denver International Airport, then I would have no trouble believing it
@@winterx2348 DIA cost far less, and I had far fewer problems. 20 years later it’s one of the busiest airports in North America so yes, renovations and updates take a long time
@@Matt-yg8ub I was referencing the famous Denver international airport conspiracy theories. Seems like a fine airport, but if you want to get lost in a funny rabbit hole, I suggest looking it up
@@winterx2348 oh, trust me, I went down that rabbit hole, many times. I used to have access to all those tunnels myself :-)
Please, could you do a series of useless projects only in Brazil. For example, in Rio de Janeiro there are two airports. As one of them (the largest) is further away from the center, it has a smaller demand. The mayor forced flights to be redirected there. But this also led to further demand reduction and line closures.
Was there a covid-19 pandemic in 2012 except if my ears misheard Simon, I believe he said the airport opened to the public in October 2012! He needs to correct that.
Yeah it's extremely common for beard boy to get things very wrong
MERS
The Line has a insane sci-fi action flick in it ready to emerge.
the growth of the beard is fun to track. also love y’all’s content, keep up the great work!
Imagine the massive mirror facade and the desert sun. Well, if there is any wildlife around now, there will be ash and half melted sand in the future.
The line seems like it would be living in a bunch of connected cruise ships.
5:10 You said the airport opened in October 2012 when you meant to say it opened in October 2020.
"Finally amidst delays due to the Covid 19 pandemic, the airport opened in 2012."
Am I in a parallel universe?
The Danish researcher Bent Flyjberg coined the “Iron Law of Megaprojects”: “Over time, over budget, over and over again.”
Also: “survival of the unfittest.” Check him out!
Before even watching this, if the "Line" isn't here the list ain't complete.
Am I the only one who's bothered that in the thumbnail is the Emir of Qatar who has nothing to do with Saudi Arabia? 😅
Your talk of services breaking down (as well as the wealthy living on higher levels) reminds me of J. G. Ballard's 1975 novel "High Rise". It seems that "1984" is not the only dystopian novel that someone took to be an instruction manual.
"Germany..it's a country where trains run on time"
I love love LOVE starting lazy Sundays with new fact boi videos. Keep 'em coming team, doing a helluva job 🙏
Someone likes boys...
@@Darth-Claw-Killflex someone is new here and doesn't know Simon is lovingly referred to as 'Fact Boi' by some of those whom appreciate him. Have a good day 🤙
The Line would be well served by hyperloop. Combine those 2 and everything would be (im)possible.
T… YIL (yesterday, not today :D) that Musk's hyperloop was basically only "done" to sabotage California's high speed railway.
The Line concept could totally work - it just needs to be extended: build not one, but many of these "lines", either parallel or perpendicular to each other, each line accessible from any other at the intersections. Now, let's rename these "lines" to "streets" - there you go, fixed it, who do I bill?
BER is a perfect metaphor for how Germany went downhill from its golden age in the 80's/90's
As a berliner, while we have been making fun of the ber for over a decade now, reading that first title hit me out of nowhere
As you are a self-proclaimed berliner, I am surprised your emoji isn’t a jelly donut.
@@baomao7243 that took me a minute. „Berliners“ are not „jelly doughnuts“ if you want to make that joke call them „pfannkuchen“ or „krapfen“ thats other names for the sams food. They are not doughnuts because they have no hole, and filled with more like a marmalade than jelly.
@@axbrax5697 Just poking fun using the loosely told story of President Kennedy’s speaking mishap. Sorry for “lost in translation.”
@@baomao7243 yeah absolutely. I just found it funny that i had to read your comment 3 times to get what you are saying. First i thought you implied all prople from berlin are cops.
@@baomao7243 It was NEVER a "speaking mishap". That "mishap" is a myth at best… there's a reason that the "jelly donut" (which, as AXBRAX said, isn't a donut) isn't called a Berliner in Berlin. "Berliner" is the actual true and correct demonym for inhabitants of Berlin. In Berlin, they are called (IIRC) "Pfannkuchen". In most of the rest of Germany, these "not donuts" are indeed called "Berliner".
We should make a city that's only one square block but make it 30 thousand feet high. We'd save so much land.
Great job as always, Simon! You never fail to offer us an entertaining and educational presentation. Is it your material? Is it your video delivery? Is it your tongue in cheek and smile inticing personality? Nah... It's ALL the above! Do, please, continue your great work. Cheers, Dick from Vancouver.
What a Dick...(in a good way!)
@@thejoker-wu1sp I hear that all the time.
@@dickmcshan9778 it was a compliment! Im just silly.
@@thejoker-wu1sp No worries.... I'm not bothered. :)
That mega Saudi Line city in middle of desert is so ridiculous and unnecessary you can tell its just a pure vanity project with no common sense from people who didnt actually have to earn their riches through efficiency and management
The idea of the Line sounds hilarious. The concept drawings that I've seen for it show two free-standing walls the size of a skyscraper. There's no explanation of how the base of those walls would be able to support the weight of the levels above them. Because they have the profile of long walls, any cross wind is going to hit the sides of the Line like a sail so they'll have to stand up to that kind of force across a large part of the wall's surface.
Anyone living on the interior of the Line would likely get a few minutes of sunlight per day with the sun rising over one wall around midday and setting behind the other. At best, the sunrise and sunset would line up with the ends of the Line and they'd get a full day of sunlight for a few days out of the year. Meanwhile anything falling from the upper levels has to go somewhere, turning the lower levels into the kind of place we read about in dystopian fiction.
China's ghost towns have a deeper issue to them: Real estate is the only way Chinese have to invest their money. Buying apartments is also often the only way a man can get married, a man can't be seen as a decent marriage prospect unless they own real estate, even if it's an apartment they'll never even live in. Since Chinese govt can't monitor how much money you have if it's not in your bank account, people have resorted to buying and reselling real estate that gets more expensive with each passing year due to speculation.
Simon: "Finally, amidst delays to the COVID 19 pandemic, the airport opened to the public, in 2012"
Me: "Precisely what realm of time do you inhabit? COVID-19 was after 2012, was it not?"
when you realise ALL megaprojects costed 2x or more than projected.
The Line is an idea that comes about when people have done too many lines.
You didn't just say trains run on time in Germany. You could not be more wrong than that. In Germany you are happy when you train is just late because it could be a lot worse than that.
I personnaly have never had a train that was exactly on time. But i have had tickets for trains that ended up not existing
Hilter will be pissed hear that... he worked extra hard to make them go on time...
@@rustythecrown9317 Nah that was his bro Mussolini
@@padinspi11 don't think Mussolini had much to do with BRD's railways.
@@rustythecrown9317 Of course. I meant the dictator who was known for making trains run on time was not the moustache man but the bald italian (cool surname i found there)
I leaved 4 years in a small town near the BER airport before early 2022 when I left Germany. The airport was already a shame point of conversation to every german. Funny because all germany is under construction and everything is super slow, during the 4 years I lived there the train station near my place was under construction and they only managed to dig a improvise tunnel under the 2 tracks. Anyway, the BER airport is already outdated, you have escalters to go up to food area, but only stars to go down (is there is an elevator, no one knows or can even find it).
While your correct about about the construction of the BER it was a complete failure, but its pretty sure that it will be continued to be in use mainly because there is no alternative they already shut down the old airport...
And additionaly im very surprised that it seems to run without major issues, I even traveld there once seemd pretty ok for an airport.
German here: Trains here only run on time if you time the watches by the arrival of the train....
The thumbnail is a photo of the line city and the ruler of Qatar, a place which is around 22 hours distance by car. It would've been a smaller mistake to use the Berlin airport and Viktor Orban, the head of Hungary, which is less than 10 hours by car.
Was trying to figure this out myself.
Thank you for finally addressing this neo city nonsense. I say the exact same thing for years now, and still, I hear people call me idiot for not understanding the possibilities....
now you know who the idiots were all along.
BER opened in 2012? That was uttered as one of the last sentences of that segment. Listened twice with headphones turned up to confirm, even slowing down playback speed
The Berlin-Brandenburg airport design process looks like someone tossed a bunch of tissue boxes on a table, dropped a piece of cardboard on top, and declared it finished.
On the topic of German trains running on time:
I live a quarter hour's walk outside Germany's border so I've been there quite a few times, my personal experience with the Deutsche Bahn has indeed been largely on time. But most of my German acquaintances and other Friends who spend more time in German trains tell a different story 😉
It depends on the connection and the exact routing.
There are a bunch of neuralgic choke points around Germany with some of them situated in such a way that if they fail a whole lot more than what needs to pass through them gets disrupted due to backlog.
One word sums it up. Hubris.
The 'problem' with the fire alarm system at Berlin Airport, was duplicated on a massively larger scale at Hamad Arirport in Doha, Qatar. The airport was allegedly finished but no airlines would fly in as their insurers pointed out that the fire suppression system was not to international standards despite the claims of the Qatari officials. It opened about a year later after the entire system was changed. It is a beautiful airport though.
For some reason I really like that you did a side projects about mega projects 😂😂