Construction Timeline and Phases

Construction Timeline and Phases

The Mukaab and New Murabba development follow a phased delivery strategy that has evolved significantly since the project’s February 2023 announcement. The original timeline targeted 2030 for overall completion. Following the January 2026 feasibility reassessment, the project has adopted “a more staggered and gradual approach to project delivery and the investment cycle” that extends completion to 2040 through four distinct phases. This revised timeline transforms what was initially conceived as a seven-year sprint into a seventeen-year managed urban development program — a duration more consistent with the historical delivery timelines of comparably ambitious megaprojects worldwide.

The phasing strategy reflects lessons learned from other Saudi Vision 2030 giga-projects. NEOM’s original timeline has undergone similar revisions, and the Kingdom’s leadership has signaled a preference for delivering tangible, usable outcomes at each stage rather than pursuing aggressive completion dates that risk quality, cost overruns, and economic overheating. For New Murabba, this means each phase must produce functioning neighborhoods with complete infrastructure, not partially built districts awaiting future completion.

Project Announcement — February 2023

Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman announced the launch of the New Murabba Development Company on February 16, 2023. The announcement revealed the Mukaab’s 400-meter cube design, the 19-square-kilometer development scope, and the PIF’s backing as the project’s funding vehicle through the newly established New Murabba Development Company (NMDC), chaired by the Crown Prince himself. Site preparation and planning activities began immediately following the announcement.

The announcement positioned New Murabba as the world’s largest modern downtown development, with a total floor area of 25 million square meters across 18 planned neighborhoods. The Mukaab, at 2 million square meters of internal floor space, serves as the iconic centerpiece — a structure so large that 20 Empire State Buildings could fit within its 64-million-cubic-meter volume. The ambition signaled by the announcement was matched by rapid contractor mobilization: AtkinsRealis was appointed as masterplan architect, and earth-moving operations commenced within months.

Pre-Construction and Contractor Mobilization — 2023

The months following the announcement saw a concentrated period of contractor appointments and design mobilization. AtkinsRealis, headquartered in Montreal and formerly known as SNC-Lavalin, assumed the lead design role encompassing advisory, architecture, masterplanning, and engineering services. The firm’s design drew on Najdi architectural traditions, connecting the project to the cultural heritage of the Najd region of central Saudi Arabia while proposing engineering solutions for a structure without precedent in human building history.

Bechtel Corporation signed its project management agreement with NMDC in August 2023, establishing the organizational framework for infrastructure delivery. Bechtel’s appointment brought to the project a heritage of mega-project delivery including the Jubail Industrial City in Saudi Arabia, the Channel Tunnel, and Hong Kong International Airport. Excavation operations commenced in 2023, initiating what would become one of the largest earthmoving programs in global construction history — the removal of 40 million cubic meters of material from the al-Qirawan site.

Phase 1 — Target Completion: 2030

Phase 1 encompasses Communities 2, 4, and 5 within the New Murabba masterplan, delivering a mix of residential and commercial uses. The phase targets 8,000 homes for 35,000 residents, establishing the first inhabitable neighborhoods within the development. Infrastructure including roads, utilities, public spaces, and community facilities for these communities falls within Phase 1 scope.

The selection of Communities 2, 4, and 5 for Phase 1 reflects strategic site planning that balances construction logistics with early occupancy requirements. These communities must function as complete, self-sustaining neighborhoods from the moment residents move in, with full utility services (water, sewage, electricity, telecommunications), road access to the broader Riyadh network, retail and community facilities within walking distance, and adequate separation from ongoing construction activity in adjacent phases. The 15-minute walkable downtown concept must be partially realized within Phase 1, meaning that residents can access daily necessities without automobile dependence.

Phase 1 infrastructure delivery is supported by Parsons Corporation’s 60-month Infrastructure Lead Design Consultant contract, which commenced in January 2026 and extends through approximately January 2031. This timeline provides continuous design support through Phase 1 completion and into early Phase 2A activities.

Phase 2A — Target Completion: 2034

Phase 2A is directly linked to the FIFA 2034 World Cup, which Saudi Arabia will host. The New Murabba Stadium, designed by Arup with construction starting in 2027 and opening planned for 2032, serves as the anchor deliverable for this phase. The stadium’s 46,010 seats will host group stage and round of 32 fixtures, requiring completion a minimum of two years before the tournament to allow commissioning, test events, and FIFA certification.

Additional residential, hospitality, and entertainment infrastructure required to support the World Cup event falls within Phase 2A. This includes hotel capacity for visiting fans and officials, transportation connections, security infrastructure, and broadcast facilities. The FIFA World Cup serves as an immovable external deadline that provides schedule discipline for Phase 2A — unlike internal milestones that can be adjusted, a global sporting event with billions of viewers cannot be postponed because a construction phase is running late.

The stadium investment is part of a $20 billion national stadium development program encompassing 15 venues across Riyadh, Jeddah, Al Khobar, NEOM, and Qiddiya. This positions the New Murabba Stadium not as an isolated project but as a node within a Kingdom-wide sports infrastructure network.

Phase 2B — Target Completion: 2035

Phase 2B continues the buildout of neighborhoods and community infrastructure beyond the World Cup catalyst, delivering additional residential capacity and commercial space. This phase benefits from the infrastructure installed during Phases 1 and 2A, allowing construction to focus on buildings and public realm rather than primary utility networks.

The one-year gap between Phase 2A (2034) and Phase 2B (2035) suggests that Phase 2B encompasses construction activities that were advanced alongside Phase 2A work but not required for World Cup readiness. This efficient scheduling avoids the stop-start pattern that plagues phased developments where each phase is treated as an independent project rather than an overlapping program.

Phase 3 — Target Completion: 2040

Phase 3 encompasses the completion of remaining neighborhoods, the construction of a new airport within the development, and a high-speed train station connecting New Murabba to Saudi Arabia’s expanding rail network. The full buildout targets accommodation for 400,000 residents across 18 neighborhoods within the 19-square-kilometer site, with 104,000 residential units, 9,000 hotel rooms, 980,000 square meters of retail space, 1.4 million square meters of office space, and 620,000 square meters of leisure assets.

The airport and high-speed train station represent the most infrastructure-intensive elements of the entire development. An airport requires not only runways, terminals, and control facilities but also airspace integration with existing Saudi aviation systems, approach path clearances over surrounding development, and the regulatory approvals that govern civil aviation worldwide. The high-speed train station must connect to the broader Saudi rail network, requiring coordination with the Saudi Railways Company and alignment with the Kingdom’s expanding rail infrastructure program.

Phase 3 completion in 2040 brings the total development timeline to 17 years from announcement — a duration consistent with the delivery histories of comparable urban-scale megaprojects. The Jubail Industrial City, also managed by Bechtel, required decades of phased construction. Songdo International Business District in South Korea, at a comparable scale, has been under development since 2003. Masdar City in Abu Dhabi, originally planned for 2016 completion, continues development more than 15 years after groundbreaking.

The Mukaab Building Timeline

The Mukaab building itself does not fit neatly into the phase structure disclosed publicly. As of January 2026, construction has been suspended beyond excavation and piling. The building’s completion date is no longer specified, though it is implicitly part of the later phases given the suspension of superstructure work.

The below-grade work that continues — 86 percent excavation completion and 83 percent piling completion — preserves the option to resume superstructure construction without the delay of restarting foundation work. The remaining 200 piles and approximately 5.6 million cubic meters of excavation could be completed within months at current rates, meaning that the foundation would be ready for superstructure steel erection whenever the feasibility review concludes and the project receives authorization to proceed.

The 1 million tonnes of structural steel required for the Mukaab’s mega-frame represents the world’s largest structural steel order. Procurement, fabrication, and erection of this quantity of steel will require years of work from multiple steel mills and erection contractors, meaning that steel procurement decisions must be made well in advance of erection start dates to ensure material availability.

Key Milestone Dates

Schedule Risk and Mitigation

The extended timeline from 2023 to 2040 introduces schedule risks that compound over seventeen years. Supply chain disruptions — whether from global events, regional conflicts, or commodity price volatility — can delay material procurement for critical-path items like the 1 million tonnes of structural steel. Labor market fluctuations in Saudi Arabia, where construction workforce demand across simultaneous Vision 2030 giga-projects competes for finite skilled labor pools, create wage inflation and availability risks that can slow construction rates below planned levels.

Bechtel’s project management methodology addresses these risks through rolling-wave planning — detailed scheduling for the current and next phase, with progressively less granular planning for phases further in the future. This approach acknowledges that conditions in 2035 cannot be predicted with the precision needed for detailed scheduling, while ensuring that near-term activities are sequenced with the rigor needed to meet Phase 1’s 2030 target. Critical-path analysis identifies the activities whose delay would directly postpone phase completion, focusing management attention on the elements that matter most to schedule performance.

Weather-related schedule risk in Riyadh manifests differently than in temperate climates. Rather than rain delays, the primary weather risk is extreme heat during June through September, when outdoor labor productivity drops by 30 to 40 percent due to mandatory rest periods and reduced working hours under Saudi labor law. Construction planning must account for these seasonal productivity reductions by front-loading outdoor activities into the cooler months (October through April) and scheduling indoor or shaded work during summer. Over a seventeen-year program, the cumulative impact of summer productivity losses amounts to years of equivalent lost production time, making seasonal planning a strategic scheduling discipline rather than a tactical adjustment.

Budget Management Across Phases

The $50 billion total project budget must be allocated across four phases spanning seventeen years, requiring financial planning that accounts for inflation, currency fluctuations, and the escalation of material and labor costs over time. Phase 1’s budget allocation must cover not only the direct construction costs of Communities 2, 4, and 5 but also the shared infrastructure — trunk utilities, arterial roads, and site-wide systems — that serves the entire development but must be installed during the earliest phases.

The phased delivery strategy provides financial flexibility that a single-completion approach would not. Cash outflows can be managed against PIF investment funding cycles, with each phase’s expenditure scaled to match available capital. Revenue generation from completed phases — sales of Phase 1 residential units, lease income from commercial space, and operational revenue from hospitality and entertainment venues — can partially fund subsequent phases, reducing the total external funding requirement. This self-funding capability improves the project’s financial resilience against potential funding constraints, a consideration that informed the January 2026 decision to adopt the phased approach.

For verified timeline reporting, see Reuters and Construction Week Online, which have provided independent coverage of the project’s schedule evolution.

For related analysis, see contractor ecosystem, feasibility reassessment, excavation progress, stadium design, investment timeline, and Vision 2030 alignment.