Metropolitan Jakarta, Indonesia, is home to over 30 million inhabitants, and that number is growing. To provide water for its citizens, the massive capital has extracted much of its groundwater (both legally and illegally), and as a result, the coastal city is sinking to dangerous lows. With 40 percent of the city already lying below sea level—a percentage that will likely increase—Jakarta is in need of solutions to protect it from catastrophic flooding. Major floods in 2007 and 2014 killed dozens of people, left thousands homeless, and filled the city with highly polluted water.

Enter the Garuda. The National Capital Integrated Coastal Development consortium will build a new set of barrier islands and a sea wall that will guard the city from waves and storm surges. The extensive project will take the shape of the Garuda, a mythical bird and symbol of Indonesia. While construction is already under way (the first pile was planted in October 2014), KuiperCompagnons, the Dutch firm behind much of the design, estimates that the project will take 30 to 40 years to complete.

The archipelago will provide extra real estate for the growing city of Jakarta.

Behind the 79-foot sea wall and atop the constructed archipelago will be Jakarta’s newest seaside neighborhoods, which will house an estimated 300,000 people. The 17 islands are part of an even larger project that will include a new airport and an expansion of the city’s port. The estimated price tag for Indonesia’s ambitious infrastructure master plan? Forty billion U.S. dollars. With any such project, planners have been met with serious environmental concern, particularly regarding local wildlife and the stagnation of water in newly created bays. But however urgent the warning cries of project critics, the flooding of Jakarta remains a very real threat and must be addressed. The Garuda is, at the very least, a symbol of hope—hope that the sea will stay out of the city.