World Cup 2022 longshot Qatar has to build all its stadiums, an international airport, a high-speed rail network and scores of hotels but it also plans on building a city of 200,000 that will serveas the center of World Cup activities. The price tag is $42.9 billion, but the tiny Middle East nation plans on going ahead with the venture whether or not it wins the World Cup.
“We’removing regardless,” said Yasir Abdullah al-Jamal, Qatar’s technical bid book director who attended college in Texas. “We are a small country but we have a lotof dreams, a lot of ambitions. We want to change the perception of FIFA and the world that the World Cup can’t be held in a small country.”
Included in the plans are specially designedstadiums with solar-powered cooling systems. The goal is to reduce temperatures, which hover around 110 degrees, to the low 80s.
The city of Lusail will be built on the outskirts of thecapital Doha. It will feature four skyscrapers, 37 residential towers, shopping malls and a 1,400-boat marina, as well as one of the World Cup stadiums.