Megaprojects of the near future.

The rulers of the United Arab Emirates have insane amounts of money to spend. Thanks to

everyone’s thirst for oil, they’ve been on a construction spree unlike any the world

has ever seen for such a small country, investing in one ambitious infrastructure project after

another. At one point, 24 percent of all the world’s construction cranes we in Dubai.

Unfortunately, that was before the 2008-2009 global financial meltdown, which led to much

of the investment in the city drying up faster than the water on somebody who just got out

of the pool at the Burj Khalifa. But the government insists that many of these projects have simply

been delayed, and are putting their money where their mouth is with the recent approval

of a $32 billion expansion of Dubai’s Al Maktoum International Airport that will break

ground by the end of 2014. When complete, it’ll suddenly have the capacity to become

the busiest airport in the world in both total passengers - at 220 million a year - and total

cargo of 12 million annual tonnes of goods that can move through it--that’s almost

3 times more than what takes off from the runways of the world’s current leader, Hong

Kong’s International Airport. It’s terminals will able to hold 100 of the massive new Airbus

A380’s that are over 2/3ds of a football field long and cost $300 million a pop. The

UAE’s Emirates airline already owns more of those planes than anyone else in the world.

It’s the largest airline in the Middle East and will eventually move into the Al Maktoum

airport to help jump start activity. The government’s plan is for the airfield to be the heartbeat

of a city within the larger city of Dubai called World Central, which the UAE thinks

will be home to 900,000 residents in the near future. The airport also hopes to be the central

hub for the emerging Middle East, North African, and South Asian economic bloc known as MENASA.

But time will tell whether the Shaikh’s vision for Dubai actually becomes a reality,

or fades like some vicious mirage.

This is Songdo International Business District, the world’s most futuristic urban area.

It’s being built 40 miles southwest of the second-most populated city in the world, Seoul,

South Korea. The $40 billion project is along the waterfront in the city of Incheon and

is embracing two key concepts that urban planners are in love with: The first is Aerotropolis,

which means the airport is integrated into the urban center instead of banishing it far

outside of the city. This allows for shorter trips to and from the place that’s going

to get you out of town--this’ll be an emerging pattern in 21st century planning as air travel

continues to become accessible to more and more people in our increasingly interconnected

world. Songdo is brilliantly directly connected to the airport via the 7-mile long Incheon

bridge so you’ve just got a straight shot that gets you there in like 10 minutes that’s

also got these incredible views and is the first thing visitors see coming into the city.

The other key theme is Ubiquitous City, which is a uniquely Korean concept where every device,

component, service is linked to an informational network through wireless computing technology,

allowing for greater coordination and a more efficient and synchronized city than has ever

been possible before. An example of this is Songdo’s trash system, which won’t rely

on garbage trucks, because a network of tubes will suck in the garbage straight from the

can and through a system of pipes, transport it efficiently to treatment facilities. Songdo’s

so dedicated to being a model for sustainability that it has set aside 40% of its land area

to be outdoor spaces like parks and it’ll become the first city in the world outside

of the United States to achieve LEED certification, which is the highest energy consumption and

waste standards possible with currently available technology. As a tip-of-the-hat to other great

cities, Songdo will also incorporate replicas of New York’s Central Park and Venice’s

historic canals. Overall, construction is currently half done. It already has 67,000

people living there studying and working at its many schools, including the foreign campuses

of four American universities, but it’s struggled to attract Korean businesses as

the government is refusing to give tax incentives for relocation, because that would create

an unfair playing field favoring Songdo over other cities in the country. Still, if it

stays squarely focused on the future, Songdo’s a long-term investment that’s likely to

pay off.

Nicaragua is about to embark on what may be the boldest and riskiest Megaproject in the

history of the world. One that will change it forever. It’s going to build the biggest

canal in the world . The $50 billion Nicaragua Grand Canal will cut the country in half to

connect the Atlantic Ocean with the Pacific, running through the biggest lake in Central

America. At 173-miles-long, it’ll dwarf the 120 mile-long Suez Canal in Egypt and

directly compete with the Panama Canal 250 miles to the south, through which more than

15,000 ships already pass each year. But in the coming years, many more ships full of

goods and raw materials are going to try and pass back and forth from the Pacific to the

Atlantic to connect Europe, Brazil and the Eastern Coast of the United States, with China

and the rest of Asia.

The story of how little six-million-man Nicaragua, the second-poorest country in the Western

Hemisphere, is able to afford such an expensive project is a fascinating case study of globalization,

and how capitalism is increasingly driving geopolitical decision-making. In June of last

year, Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega’s Sandanista party also controlled parliament

and - without any real debate - gave a 50-year, no-bid contract to Chinese telecommunications

magnate Wang Jing to build and manage the proposed canal. And, it just so happens that,

also last year, according to a report in the LA Times, Wang hosted a number of Nicaraguan

officials and businessmen on a trip to China, where the powerful and connected Wang supposedly

flaunted his extreme wealth and was accompanied at all times by Chinese military officers

and other high-ranking governmental officials. So, it’s tough to believe him when he insists

that the Chinese government is not financially backing the project, especially when we already

know that China is using state financed companies to buy more and more assets in the West. The

opportunity to own the world’s most valuable shipping lane seems too tempting for the Chinese

government to pass up.

The supposedly democratic government of Nicaragua is using a page out of China’s playbook,

by refusing to release any of the studies about the impacts of the canal until December

2014, the same month construction will begin. That’s because there is a loooong list of

environmental and humanitarian concerns. The project will tear through countless ecosystems

and communities, and rip into the source of much of the country’s fresh water, Lake

Nicaragua. The residents whose land is on the canal route have received no word on what

the government plans to do for them in terms of compensation and relocation.

But, as easy as it is to criticize the way the project is being handled, it’s also

fairly hypocritical of me, as an American, to mount a very convincing argument against

the plan. Afterall, about a hundred years ago, US President Theodore Roosevelt basically

took control of Panama and pushed through the canal there, a project that’s benefitted

America time and time again, and has made Panama economically better off in the long

run. But we’re not living in 1914...

Now is the time of social media-fueled revolution, where images and video fly around the world

instantly, empowering even the poorest locals to use the power of the global community to

rally support for their cause and exert political pressure in unpredictable ways. So, what I’m

saying is that it may have been easy for President Ortega see all that money flying around and

secretly, singlehandedly approve a massively disruptive project like this, but when those

bulldozers start tearing apart the countryside - and people’s homes - there’s probably

going to be hell to pay for not consulting the voters at all. This could be shaping up

to be another one of those important moments of struggle in world history between the powerful

have’s and the have nots.

On the one hand, you have the limitless funding of the Chinese who want that flag-in-the-dirt,

statement-making moment for their country of staking a claim in the Americas. We know

the canal would benefit corporations in the west through the shipping and trade benefits

I outlined earlier. And with construction set to begin in Nicaragua next month - there

doesn’t seem to be any stopping it from starting.

But on the other hand, this thing is going to take six years at a minimum to finish,

and if we’ve learned anything from recent history, it’s that a lot can happen in six

weeks or six months, let alone six years.

On a person-to-person basis, the United Arab Emirates has the biggest Ecological Footprint

in the world thanks to its prolific oil production and the massive construction boom that’s

been going on there for the last decade. So it’s surprising to learn that the UAE is

home to Masdar--the world’s first zero-carbon, zero-waste city. To meet this ambitious goal,

it’s powered only by renewable energy, like a 54-acre 88,000 panel solar farm beyond the

cities’ walls. That’s right, I said walls. The designers studied ancient cities to learn

the most effective planning methods to reduce energy consumption. One of the key things

are walls that helps to keep the high, hot desert winds away from its inhabitants. They

also raised the entire foundation of the site a few feet above the surrounding land to keep

Masdar cooler and spaced the buildings much closer together to keep the streets and walkways

narrow, and mostly in the shade. These techniques - combined with 130-foot wind towers that

suck air from above and convert it into a cool breeze blowing on the street - mean Masdar

is a comfortable 70 degrees fahrenheit when just a few meters away, the thermostat rises

well above 100. Plus, there’s no driving in the city and any car that enters is parked

at the outskirts. A system of driverless electric vehicles then ferry people from place to place

underground, and a light rail system is also available above ground, which means there’s

no need for streets. And in a move that cuts both water and electricity consumption more

than half, there are no light switches or water taps--everything is controlled by movement

sensors. This unprecedented level of environmental consciousness has won it hard-earned endorsements

from environmental conservation groups like Greenpeace and the World Wildlife Fund. The

German engineering giant Siemens has located its Middle East headquarters there, as has

the International Renewable Energy Agency. The Masdar Institute for Science and Technology

- a small postgraduate university that was founded through a collaboration with MIT - occupies

one of Masdar’s first completed buildings and is already producing great work and first-class

researchers. So the city undeniably has a solid foundation, but it’s got a lot to

do still if it’s going to meet its ambitious goal of housing 50,000 residents and hosting

offices for 60,000 more commuters. The city’s co-founder admits that Masdar is “a fraction

of what it was supposed to be back in 2006 when we announced it. At the beginning of

the project, nobody really anticipated how difficult it is to build a city." This underscores

the point many urban planners around the world have made: that we should be focused on making

our existing cities more sustainable instead of building brand new ones. But even if Masdar

only teaches us one or two major things about what’s possible when it comes to sustainable

urban design - and it does seem like it’s already done that - then it’ll have been

worth it, even if it takes much longer to achieve its overall vision, or if it ultimately

fails. Because let’s be honest, the UAE was going to spend that $20 billion in oil

revenue on something, so it’s better for everyone that its going to an important experiment

like Masdar rather than another row of gold and marble crusted hotel skyscrapers or an

electricity-sucking indoor snow park.

This is the future--maglev trains. Japan’s all aboard. They’re spending a staggering

$85 billion over the next 30 years to connect the island’s three largest cities: Tokyo

to Nagoya to Osaka. That’s over three hundred miles that you’ll be able to cover in about

67 minutes by racing through the countryside at over 300 miles per hour. Maglev technology

uses powerful magnetic charges to move rail cars that float several inches above a concrete

guideway, rather than riding on steel wheels. This frictionless system allows for a smoother

ride at significantly higher speeds than traditional high speed rail. In contrast, California’s

planned high speed rail system that’ll eventually connect San Francisco, Los Angeles, and San

Diego, will only be able to travel at top speeds of 220 mph, but its estimated overall

cost is ten billion dollars less than the Japanese system and will cover a distance

two and a half times as long. The Chinese city of Shanghai has had a short maglev line

in operation since 2004, but the Japanese line is the world’s first intercity link

to gain public approval. The project’s called Chuo Shinkansen - or as the Japanese refer

to it, Rinia Mota Ka - and is a culmination of 40 years of Japanese maglev development

that began with an unlikely partnership between Japan Airlines and Japanese National Railways.

What’s really impressive about this project is that JR Central - the company that’s

building the line - will finance the project without public money, thanks largely to the

success of the bullet train it’s run from Tokyo to Osaka since the mid 1960’s. The

company’s also pushing hard to construct a maglev line between the American capital

city of Washington DC and New York, which would showcase the technology to the American

market and the rest of the western world. The Japanese government has even offered to

fully finance the 40 mile first leg of the US project from Baltimore to DC, a proposal

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe directly pitched to President Barack Obama during a meeting

last year. But critics of Maglev say the costs outweigh the benefits. Opponents have raised

questions about the sheer monetary cost of the project, its environmental impact, and

whether it is really needed. Tunnels will be blasted through some of Japan’s highest

mountains to build the Chuo Shinkansen line. But regardless of what the critics say, something

had to change. When the Maglev system is done it will help alleviate the overcrowding on

Japan’s existing rail system and make it feasible for commuters into Tokyo to live

further outside of the city than they can now.