Saudi Arabian royal and billionaire Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal has revealed that the Jeddah Tower, which will be the world’s tallest structure, will cost nearly 100 billion riyals ($26 billion) to complete over the next three and half years.
Construction has officially resumed on the project after it was paused in 2018.
“We are back,” Prince Alwaleed, chairman of Kingdom Holding Company (KHC), said in a post on messaging platform X.
Jeddah Tower will have a dramatic impact on the city’s skyline and position Saudi Arabia as a centre for architectural excellence and economic opportunity, the post said.
The tower will exceed 1,000 metres when complete. The development consortium, led by Jeddah Economic Company (JEC), said 63 of the planned 157 floors have been constructed, with the project due to be completed in 42 months.
The surrounding development, located in the Obhur district in the north of the city, will measure an estimated 1.7 million square metres.
Prince Alwaleed was quoted on Tuesday by the Saudi daily Alwatan as saying that the tower will house up to 100,000 people when it is completed in 2028.
The prince said the project has already impacted surrounding areas as local property prices have increased.
Work on Jeddah Tower began in 2013 but was halted in early 2018 amid a nationwide anti-corruption purge led by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Key figures associated with the project were detained, including the chairman of Binladin Group, the project’s main contractor.
At 1km high, the Jeddah Tower will be taller than Dubai’s Burj Khalifa, which is currently the world’s tallest structure at nearly 828 metres.
It was designed by US architect Adrian Smith, who also designed Burj Khalifa.
Besides luxurious apartments, the Tower will include a Four Seasons hotel, office spaces, retail outlets and the world’s highest observation deck located on the 157th floor, according to JEC.
The tower features a “three-petal” base and a tapered, aerodynamic silhouette, which help address the significant technical challenges associated with such tall structures.
Last year, industry experts told AGBI that with available technology builders can aim much higher than 1,000 metres.
“Using advanced structural engineering and construction methods, we conceptualised a three-kilometre tower – 10 times the original height of the Eiffel Tower,” said Bill Baker, a structural engineer with SOM in Chicago who worked on the Burj Khalifa.
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