- These projects are prime examples of great ideas having a miserable meeting with reality.
Megaprojects are some of the biggest building projects ever undertaken. While there’s no official classification, they typically involve construction on a massive scale and price tags of upward of $1 billion. For some examples, think of the Three Gorges or Hoover Dams, or just the ancient Egyptian pyramids.
These structures are famous because they were completed. But for every megaproject that builders finish, there are probably 10 more that failed because they were simply too stupidly ambitious.
Here are seven examples of megaprojects that failed under their own weight (not literally, thank goodness).
1. The MOSE Project
In case you didn’t know, Venice is both sinking and flooding. The MOSE Project is a planned project to stop that from happening.
Originally launched in 1987, the MOSE Project proposed installing massive gates on the bottom of the Adriatic that could be raised to stop water from flowing into Venice. The plan was approved, and construction started. Then it stopped, and then started, and then stopped, and…
The MOSE Project has hit almost every imaginable snag on the way. It ran over budget, it hit delays and failures, and then the entire committee heading the project was arrested for bribery.
The latest (fourth overall) projected completion date for the gates was 2025. Although they’re operational, they’re not finished, which means MOSE missed its deadline once again.
2. Bridge to Nowhere
Officially known as Gravina Island Bridge, the Bridge to Nowhere was supposed to connect the town of Ketchikan, Alaska, with Gravina Island, where the town’s airport is located. It was to replace the ferry that currently moves passengers back and forth.
In 2004, Alaska’s representatives in Congress secured approval for the bridge. They secured $398 million in funding, and construction began.
However, representatives from elsewhere in the U.S. considered the Gravina Island Bridge a hyperlocal project that should’ve been paid for by the state of Alaska. In 2005, the funding got canceled, and the project came to an end.
The road that would’ve connected to the bridge was built, though. So, there’s now also a Road to Nowhere on Gravina Island that no one ever uses.
3. Burj Al Babas
Burj Al Babas was supposed to be the most luxurious residential development in Turkey. It would’ve consisted of 732 identical houses, each modeled to look kind of like a miniature Disney castle.
Construction of Burj Al Babas began in 2014, and half the castles sold almost immediately. But the project’s troubles began that very same year.
Although the developers were raking in money, the 2,500 construction workers building Burj Al Babas complained that they hadn’t been paid. Then came the revelations of environmental violations and political instability in Turkey.
By 2019, the developer was bankrupt, and Burj Al Babas went in the trash.
4. Palace of the Soviets
What’s the best way to trumpet the glories of communism? A really big building, of course!
The Palace of the Soviets was approved for construction as soon as the Soviet Union formed in 1922. It was to be a new national political convention center in Moscow. It would’ve fit 20,000 people and risen to nearly 1,400 feet, topped by an enormous statue of Lenin.
As it turned out, though, the Soviet Union wasn’t really in a place to build huge, expensive palaces, what with the Russian Civil War and the country’s struggling industry and empty coffers. Despite it all, construction did begin in 1933 and continued until the armies of Nazi Germany marched over the Soviet border.
After that, the Soviets lost interest in the frankly ridiculously sized palace and scrapped the project.
5. Ryugyong Hotel
It’s not just the Soviets in the communist bloc that started enormous go-nowhere building projects. North Korea did it too with the Ryugyong Hotel.
In 1987, North Korea started building this 1,080-foot-tall luxury hotel. It was supposed to glorify the Kim regime and house foreign tourists coming to see the country.
There were a couple of big problems with this plan, though. One, North Korea had no money for the hotel. Two, considering how difficult it is to get a visa for North Korea, who was supposed to stay here?
As of now, the Ryugong Hotel still isn’t finished. The exterior is more or less done, but the insides are reportedly still bare concrete and scaffolding.
6. Germania
Don’t think it’s just the communists who dreamed up ridiculously unfeasible building projects. The Third Reich did plenty of it as well, but perhaps Hitler’s most overambitious dream was Germania.
This city was meant to replace Berlin as the world capital after total German victory in World War II. It would’ve included monuments, museums, and a massive Volkshalle from which Hitler would rule.
Of course, the Germania project never got off the ground for obvious reasons. Yet, the scale model of Germania was reportedly one of Hitler’s favorite things to look at during the war.
7. Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid
Technically speaking, the Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid is not a failed construction project. I suppose it can’t fail when it’s utterly impossible to build in the first place.
Should it ever be constructed, the Shimizu would be an enormous 6,500-foot-tall pyramid in Tokyo Bay. Planned to house well over 1 million people, it’s a proposed solution to overpopulation through sustainable construction.
The problem is that the structure is so massive that current construction materials physically cannot support it. There’s zero point in trying to build it because, based on the finest scientific understanding of physics available, it would collapse on itself before the builders could finish even the foundation.
Yet, the Shimizu Corporation aims to have the pyramid finished by 2110, banking on the development of new, ultra-strong, and lightweight construction materials. It’s good to have a dream, I guess.