This week, Egypt revealed its plans to build a new capital city in the desert east of Cairo, closer to the Red Sea. The currently nameless city is a proposed $45 billion project – which will be funded by investors – and is expected to house 5 million people and be completed within 5 to 7 years, although some say 12 years is more realistic.
Cairo has been facing issues of overpopulation and congestion for a while, something the new city is meant to ameliorate. According to Egypt’s housing minister Mostafa Madbouly, the population of Cairo (currently 18 million) is expected to double within the next 40 years. The new city will provide places for the growing population to live, allowing some of the traffic and pollution to spread into an easier to manage space, and ensuring that there is no development on the precious agricultural land closer to the banks of the Nile. Many feel that the project is also a way to boost Egypt’s economy by creating jobs in construction, retail, and the government; a way to reach their goal of 6% growth in the next 5 years.
Though cities have been built before, never has one been built this big – according to the website (simply dubbed thecapitalcairo.com), the new capital is to be 700 sq. km, an area roughly the size of Singapore. That space will hold 663 health centres, 1250 religious centres, and almost 2000 schools, as well as all of its government buildings and foreign embassies. Designed to be smart and sustainable, the city will contain 91 sq. km of solar panels as well as an electric railway.
However, many are dubious that the city will be successful, citing planned cities like Caofeidian in China, an “eco-city” that was supposed to attract a million people but is now only half built and contains a few thousand inhabitants. Egypt in particular has not had success – it has built 22 satellite cities and towns, which currently contain altogether less than a million residents. One major example is New Cairo, which was built 15 years ago, but has only been able to attract a few hundred thousand, well below the millions it was supposed to attract. As the Guardian reports, this was “an irony lost on Egypt’s investment minister, Ashraf Salman, when he quipped that Cairo’s yet-to-be-named replacement would be “the new New Cairo”.
Building a new city is not impossible though. Brasilia, the new capital of Brazil inaugurated in 1960, and Astana, which became the capital of Kazakhstan in 1997, both seem to be developing a satisfied and loyal population.
The most important factor in the success of these new cities is making sure people want to live there. Simick Arese, an anthropologist at Oxford, says that “governments think they can just move people to new areas…but actually people go where they want to go”. While Egypt’s new capital has plenty of space for parks and new jobs, as well as a transport system connecting it to the current Cairo, Khaled Fahmy, history professor in Cairo feels that the government should focus more on improving living conditions in Cairo, rather than spending lavish amounts of money on a new city. According to him, “Cairenes and Egyptians, were not informed, let alone consulted about this move”; perhaps in order to improve the lives of Egyptians, it would be best to consult the Egyptians themselves.
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