qatarperegrine | Evolution of the Corniche

I heard a few months ago that Qatar's population doubled between 2006 and 2008. That seems fairly impressive even to someone who grew up in Dubai.

It was around 750,000 when I moved here in 2004, and the government predicted it would pass 2 million by the beginning of this year, though I've never heard confirmation that it did.

We'll see what happens now that the construction industry is nosediving.

The figures I heard for 2006 and 2008 were 800,000 and 1.5 million. In any case, you presumably discover new roads and neighborhoods on a regular basis where you remember sand. Which can be disorientating and awesome, often simultaneously.

From what I've heard, Qatar's construction industry isn't doing that badly, perhaps because of projects that were commissioned months or years ago. I have yet to figure out, however, who is living in all those new buildings. Aside from the nascent financial sector, and obviously oil and construction, where are all the new jobs?

A friend told me today that they've halted all construction projects not already under construction. That surprised me greatly, but he often knows news from the Arabic newspapers that never makes it into English ones, so I don't know what to think.

There's a HUGE housing crunch in Doha right now, which leads to crazy high prices. Is that not also true in Dubai? However, ALLLL the construction seems to be ultra-high-end housing, whereas what seems to really be missing from the market is low-end one-bedroom apartments and so forth. I have no idea who they expect to live at The Pearl.

HUGE housing crunch ... crazy high prices ... ALLLL the construction seems to be ultra-high-end housing ... what seems to really be missing from the market is low-end one-bedroom apartments and so forth
This sounds disturbingly familiar. Aren't you glad there's a Dubai model other places can follow (off a cliff)?

:-) Well, at least our traffic is under control, so far!

Based on my Google Maps view of Doha, your urban planners seem to have avoided some major mistakes made in Dubai. Like building primarily along the coast in order to exploit the beach. That lengthens drives, and ensures everyone is headed in the same direction. Also, I don't see any evidence of gated communities. They have limited exits, and no through roads, causing problems around their periphery.

But I do see a series of major and minor roads, with traffic from the latter forced on to the former in order to get out of a given neighborhood. This does not scale well. Up to a certain point, it is great at keeping traffic moving fast, but then it breaks down badly. The only grid I see is in the southwest of the city, and looks to be in an industrial area. Also, I haven't heard anything about plans for mass transit. So don't count on things staying nice forever.

There are gated communities, but they're on a small scale compared to Saudi's. I don't know how Dubai's compares. I don't recall ever thinking "If only I could cut through this gated community to get where I'm going!"

Yes, the grid is the industrial area, which is actually notable for HORRIBLE HORRIBLE TRAFFIC OF DOOM, although not so much in the grid area, I guess.

We have buses now. They were planning a lightrail system, but I'm not sure if that got scrapped along with the Olympic bid.

In terms of traffic getting worse, I'm sure it will. Doha has doubled in population since I've lived here, but there definitely aren't twice as many roads!

I don't know how Dubai's compares.
Most construction in the past 10 years has been in or near such communities. Stack enough of them side by side, and you end up with the disaster zone like Sheikh Zayed Road, a 30-mile parking lot with an almost mocking 75 mph speed limit.

We have buses now.
But are they reliable and useful, and do people who can afford cars use them? This makes a huge difference. In Dubai, citizens never went near them, and it was rare to see anyone over the age of 21 get on board unless they were working or lower middle class. Heck, even DC has some class issues with its buses. (The Metro, by contrast, abounds with suits.)

Forgot to mention -- the huge thing they're doing right now to ease congestion is converting the most high-traffic roundabouts either to just lights or to roundabouts with lights. It's made an immense difference. It's made parts of Doha accessible to me that I had just avoided in the past because getting to them was so utterly miserable.

converting the most high-traffic roundabouts ... roundabouts with lights
This is suboptimal. At a certain point, they too get choked up. And since population growth is so rapid, one cannot reasonably plan for a street having only a certain amount of traffic for an extended period. Putting in intersections costs money and disrupts traffic, but it is at least a long-term solution.

I'd suspect they're doing this in phases. If they'd closed Burger King and TV Roundabouts long enough to convert to just lights, there'd have been some sort of coup. ;-) Maybe once other roads are constructed (WHEN WILL D RING EVER REOPEN DEAR GOD!?!) they'll be able to take them out of commission for longer.

there'd have been some sort of coup.
Yeah, well, that doesn't seem to take much out there. Just saying...

OMG I love your icon!!!!

That's it, completely off topic, just loving the Bayeux LOLTapestry.

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Evolution of the Corniche

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