Dissertation_Dr Faisal Almubarak

151
big multi-story apartment buildings with commercial spaces on the street level on prospering Khalid
Street in Al-Khobar. He hired an Arab architect, Niqulla Salem who introduced the Mediterranean
multi-story style to the region. In the new residential units, no space was assigned for livestock for
household production, a storage room for dates and foodstuffs, or a water well. Unlike the traditional
introverted homes, the new units were adorned with wide windows and doors opened onto wide, straight
streets, all to meet the new building codes of the municipalities. The architectural style that was opted
by Salem was more suited to the Mediterranean region than to the hot and humid climate of the Eastern
Province. The new style was to inspire mass emulation. Abdullah N. Al-Subaie, The Discovering of
Oil and its Impact on the Social Life in the Eastern Province, 1352/1933-1380/1960: A Study in
Social History. Second Edition. (Riyadh: Asharief Press, 1989.), 160.
42 Ibid, 170.
43
Al-Subaie, 1989.
44
As will be discussed in detail in the chapter on Riyadh, the Doxiadis plan was based on experience
accumulated in Western physical urban planning. Lots were rectangular, and the city was zoned into
areas each with a certain lot sizes- so that the northern areas were given larger lots, hence encouraging
higher-income households to live in the north and lower-income groups in the unpopular southern part
of Riyadh where lots were smaller. As such the Plan introduced an economic plan to the city, one that
sorts income groups in space, in contrast to the mixed and semi-autonomous traditional quarter system.
The plan institutionalized the concept of the setback, thus encouraging the villa, a housing unit
surrounded by open space.
45
Saleh A. Al-Hathloul and Anis-ur-Rahmaan, 206
46
Ibid., 209.
47
Ibid., 206.
4
$ Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Ministry of Planning. 1983. Achievements of the Development Plans:
1390-1403 (1970-1983), 2.
4
9 Interview with the Saudi Minister of Financial Affairs and National Economy, Al Ahram, Cairo,
Egypt (July 26,1975), 5, cited by Al-Farsy, op cit, 82.
50 Peter Mansfield. The New Arabians (Chicago :J.G. Ferguson Publishing Co, 1981), 163
51
Willard A. Beling. King Faisal: and the Modernization of Saudi Arabia, edited by Willard A. Beling
(London: Croom Helm, 1980).
52 Fouad A. Al-Farsy. "King Faisal and the First Five Year Development Plan". In King Faisal: and the
Modernization of Saudi Arabia, edited by Willard A. Beling (London: Croom Helm, 1980), 61.
53 Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Ministry of Planning. Fifth Development Plan, (1410/1990-1415/1995),
399.
54
Ibid, 3.