PIF sets up developer for a new Khafji coastal district

Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund has launched Gulf Coast Development Company to turn part of Khafji’s shoreline into a combined place to live, visit, and do business. The plan covers roughly 20 square kilometers and a 10-kilometer waterfront, with private-sector and local and regional investors expected to help build it. When complete, it is intended to include eight residential neighborhoods with more than 16,000 homes, about 1,400 hotel rooms, marinas, and commercial, tourism, and education facilities. Construction will be split into three phases, with the first three neighborhoods scheduled for 2030—making this a long-term effort to give the northern Eastern Province a larger urban and tourism center, rather than a single resort project.