RIYADH: Saudi Arabia’s $500 billion giga-project NEOM has awarded a $2 billion contract for the construction of the Connector South rail line that will link its industrial city OXAGON with The Line development. A joint venture of Italy-based Webuild and Riyadh-headquartered Shibh Al-Jazira Contracting, known as Sajco, will undertake the transportation project. The road will extend south from The Line to NEOM City Station, passing through NEOM Bay Mansions, NEOM Bay Airport, all the way to OXAGON. A 75km railway line will be constructed as part of the project, the Middle East Economic Digest reported. The infrastructure corridor will consist of earthworks, 14 viaducts, seven roads and nine rail underpasses. Additionally, it will include 152 pipe and box culverts, a freight line, as well as infrastructure maintenance depots and associated facilities.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ In May 2022, NEOM issued the tender for the contract to complete construction work on an infrastructure corridor. The deadline for this contract, which was repeatedly altered, was originally set for Sept. 1 when NEOM released the offer. The Line railway system and the NEOM Industrial City Connector has been assigned an independent safety assessor, AuditSafe, an Egis subsidiary, and its partner Certifer. ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Furthermore, NEOM has requested selected companies to submit proposals by June 12 for the building of tunnels that will act as the railway link joining the NEOM Connector with the Spine. ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Contractors are also submitting bids for The Line’s cut-and-cover tunnel segments. ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Also known as NEOM Industrial City, OXAGON was formally launched in November 2021. It will be built around the Duba seaport in the southwest corner of NEOM and will include onshore elements and floating structures offshore. The industrial city project aims to promote sustainable energy, autonomous mobility, water innovation, sustainable food production and health and wellbeing. The development also targets technology and digital manufacturing, including telecommunications, space technology and robotics as well as modern construction methods. The Line, which began construction in January 2021, will eventually house 1 million people. The 170km-long development is set to be a ring of well-linked neighborhoods free of automobiles and highways. The building work plans include the construction of residential communities along the rail and infrastructure corridor as well as a network of interconnected, mirror-like high-rise skyscrapers. ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ The Line, OXAGON and the outdoor ski resort, Trojena, are all subprojects of NEOM, which aims to achieve exceptional standards of living, thriving businesses and reinventing conservation, in line with Saudi Vision 2030.