IF SIZE matters, which it does for Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, then the $12.5bn building site on Istanbul’s northern fringe matters a lot. The construction zone, a sea of concrete and cement, spills over 76.5 square kilometres (29.5 square miles), dotted by dozens of buildings, including an ultra-modern passenger terminal. It already covers an area bigger than Manhattan. A roaring hive of steamrollers, cranes, dredges, lorries loaded with piles of rubble and 35,000 workers completes the scene. By October all this will have turned into a new international airport capable of accommodating 90m passengers a year, says Ahmet Arslan, Turkey’s transport minister. Capacity will rise to 150m in five years, making it the world’s biggest aviation hub. Just to the west, an even more ambitious project, a 45km-long canal, bridging the Black and Marmara Seas, may soon be under way. Mr Erdogan wants to break ground on the project later this year.

Turkey’s megaprojects have been a source of jobs and revenue for builders, and spurred economic growth. For the man who has championed them tirelessly, they have also been a plentiful source of votes. On the campaign trail, when he is not angrily accusing Western powers of plotting to overthrow his government and carve up his country, Mr Erdogan rattles off the number of highways, tunnels and airports (29 of the latter, to be precise) that have been built on his watch.

He will soon have a chance to do so again. On April 18th, hours before his MPs rubber-stamped the extension of a state of emergency for another three months, the Turkish strongman called snap presidential and parliamentary elections. These will take place on June 24th, 18 months earlier than scheduled. Armed with emergency powers, in control of nearly all media outlets and state institutions, and enduringly popular with conservative voters, Mr Erdogan is expected to win easily in a contest that no one expects to be fair.

The new projects do make some sense. Istanbul’s main airport is bursting at the seams. Passenger numbers have nearly tripled in the past decade, reaching 63.7m last year, though they have plateaued since 2015, raising concerns that the city does not need an airport as colossal as the one now being built. Congestion is also a reason for the Kanal Istanbul project. The Bosporus, currently the only route available to vessels going in and out of the Black Sea, is one of the world’s most crowded waterways. With more twists and turns than a Turkish soap opera, and treacherous currents to match, the strait has witnessed scores of accidents over the years. In the most recent, a 225-metre-long tanker rammed into a famous waterside mansion, causing tens of millions of dollars in damage. Mr Erdogan hopes to reroute all shipping through his new canal.