Grand Mosque’s Mataf expansion  gets new name

Riyadh: Saudi Arabia has named the Mataf expansion building project at Grand Mosque as `Saudi Riwaq’ (arcade or portico).

Saudi Press Agency (SPA) reported that General President for the Affairs of the Grand Mosque and the Prophet’s Mosque, Sheikh Abdul Rahman Al-Sudais announced the name after the approval of King Salman bin Abdulaziz.

Sheikh Abdul Rahman Al-Sudais said that the Saudi Riwaq that surrounds the Abbasid portico is characterized by a much larger area that the Grand Mosque has not seen before.

It consists of four floors, which are the ground floor, the first floor, the second-floor mezzanine, and the roof.

Saudi Riwaq and the Mataf have the maximum capacity to accommodate 287,000 worshippers, and 107,000 performers of tawaf per hour.

Saudi Riwaq provides wider spaces for sects and worshippers and is characterized by the availability of all technical and service services, as well as sound and lighting systems.

In April 2022, the Kingdom completed the third expansion of the Grand Mosque, which began in 2010, and it is the largest in the history of the mosque and is located on the northern side of the Grand Mosque.

The total area of the expansion is about 1.470 million square meters and accommodates 1.850 million worshippers, thus raising the capacity of the Haram to three million worshipers, and allowing 107 thousand sects to circumambulate every hour.

The third expansion of the campus added four beacons, two of which are at King Abdullah Gate, one on the northeastern corner, and the last on the northwest corner, bringing the total number of beacons of the campus to 13 beacons.