Saudi Arabia » Introduction of Mecca

Population density in Mecca is very high. Most of the people who live in Mecca live in the old city. The city averages four million tourists a year during the hajj.

Transportation facilities related to the hajj are the main services available. Mecca has no airport, water, or rail service. Paved roads and modern expressways link Mecca with other cities in Saudi Arabia. The city has good roads. Most pilgrims access the city through the hajj terminal in Jeddah.

The governor of Mecca is appointed by the king of Saudi Arabia. A municipal council of fourteen locally elected members is responsible for the functioning of the municipality. Mecca is the capital of the Makkah province.

The city has grown substantially in the last several decades, as the convenience and affordability of jet travel has increased the number of pilgrims participating in the Hajj. Thousands of Saudis are employed year-round to oversee the Hajj and staff the hotels and shops that cater to pilgrims; these workers in turn have increased the demand for housing and services. The city is now ringed by freeways, and contains shopping malls and skyscrapers.

Non-Muslims are not permitted to enter Mecca, with the exceptions of various journalists. Road blocks are stationed along roads leading to the city. As one might expect, the existence of "forbidden cities" and the mystery of the Hajj aroused intense curiosity in European travellers. A number of them pretended to be Muslims and entered the city of Mecca and then the Kaaba to experience the Hajj for them; however the vast majority who did so knew a Muslim. The most famous account of a foreigner's journey to Mecca is A Personal Narrative of a Pilgrimage to Mecca and Al-Madina, written by Sir Richard Francis Burton. Burton travelled as a Qadiri Sufi from Afghanistan; his name, as he signed it in Arabic below his front piece portrait for "The Jew, The Gypsy and al-Islam," was al-Hajj 'Abdullah.