Qiddiya

Qiddiya is a large-scale entertainment and tourism development project located southwest of Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, around 30 minutes from the capital. Created to harness the ‘power of play’¹, the project aims to be the Kingdom’s capital of entertainment, sports and the arts, in line with the country’s Vision 2030 agenda to diversify its economy, reducing dependency on oil^{i 2}.

Spanning 360 square kilometers- almost three times the size of Walt Disney World – the new city comprises “25 distinct districts offering entertainment, sports and culture with mixed-use areas, residential communities and nature”³. It incorporates entertainment and sports facilities in six main clusters: “Theme Parks, Sports Arena, Wheel and Wings, Water & Snow, Scenic and Animal Encounters, and Event Culture and Education”⁴, in addition to housing for over 600,000 residents⁵ (Figure 1). Key attractions within the Resort Core of Qiddiya (Figure 2) include the Six Flags Thrill Park, anticipated to be one of the Middle East’s largest theme parks, featuring the world’s fastest, tallest, and longest roller coaster⁶, a water theme park which is the first of its kind in the Kingdom⁷, and the Prince Mohammed bin Salman Stadium⁸.

In terms of transportation, Qiddiya will be linked to Riyadh’s new Metro system, set to be the largest urban rail project outside China, with 176 km of elevated and underground track.

The project aims to attract around 48 million visits annually⁹ through its facilities and services, creating over 325,000 job opportunities and generating a GDP of SAR 135 billion per annum¹⁰.

Qiddiya was launched in 2018 by King Salman bin Abdulaziz¹¹. Qiddiya Investment Company (QIC), owned wholly by Saudi’s powerful Public Investment Fund (PIF), was formally registered in April 2017 with Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Commerce and Investment as a closed joint-stock company¹². QIC is responsible for developing, applying and monetizing all Qiddiya-branded products¹³. Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) worked on the site’s master plan¹⁴, and in 2018, Dar undertook infrastructure master planning and engineering services for Qiddiya Entertainment City. MEED reported that QIC selected a joint venture of local contractor Saudi Real Estate Infrastructure Company (Binyah) and Qatar’s Infraroad Trading & Contracting Company for the delivery of the infrastructure works at Qiddiya’s resort core, as well as a joint venture of local contractor Albawani and Qatar-based Urbacon Trading & Contracting Company to for the Water Park Hotel¹⁵. The investment in the project has exceeded $2.6 Billion so far.

The project is under development in three main phases:

• Phase One (2016 – 2022): Planning, designing and constructing infrastructure and anchor attractions while creating project identity and awareness.
• Phase Two (2023 – 2025): Development of the clusters
• Phase Three (2026 – 2035) – Growing Capacity¹⁶: The entertainment city will be established and provide 11,000 housing units¹⁷.