The empty subject

Please look at this sentence.

  1. It is hard to imagine what would transform the world into a peaceful place.

Another way

  1. What it would take to transform the world into a peaceful place is hard to imagine.

Why people tend to speak this way as in #2. In both sentences I see “is” as a copula?
What could be achieved speaking like in #2?
I mean, if the sentence is a long one with a linking verb in it, the sentence many times seem unclear to me. (To many other learners as well, I think. Especially if the sentence is a part of a passage and it isn’t the case “is” is used as a linking verb but the other forms of “to be”.)

Also is it possible to say #1 and #2 this way?

  1. What it would take to transform the world into a peaceful place? (pause in speaking) It is hard to imagine. or Hard to imagine.

Also why “it would take” is used in #2?
isn’t it easier to say

  1. What would transform the world into a peaceful place is hard to imagine.

Please someone clear this for me. Thanks

There is nothing to make clear.
English is full of choices. People make different choices when they speak/write.

It’s been pointed out previously that where you have a preference for one particular way of phrasing something, this does not automatically mean that a different way of phrasing something is wrong or “irrelevant”.