Highest Skyscraper in the world
History Rising: Now 129 Levels Tall
Any day now Burj Dubai will overtake Taipei 101
and become the world's tallest building. It's
already significantly higher than the Chicago
Sears Tower (not counting the spire), and is
quickly approaching the title of the highest
concrete free-standing structure. Skyscraperpage
forum has been quick to announce: "Ladies and
Gentleman, the next tallest structure EVER built
by the humans race !!!!!", and judging by the
following pictures of construction progress, it
will be a matter of only a few days.
(images credit: Nakheel Properties)
Construction update:
- Designed by Chicago architects Skidmore,
Owings & Merrill for Emaar Properties.
- Will house hotel and condominiums, be largely
residential.
- Completion date: June 30, 2009
- 959 meters high, 189 - 200 floors?
- An observation deck will be located on the
124th floor.
- The top residential level will only be 8
meters wide.
- Will have the fastest elevators in the world
with a speed of 700m/min (42.3 kmh / 26.1 mph)
- When finished, It will be almost 40% taller
than the the current tallest building, the
Taipei 101
(images credit: Hatim Saleh)
Full-grown palm trees are being planted
in boulevards around the building:
Activity at the top:
The Unimix company has just set a new world
record for the highest single-stage pumping of
concrete - 452 meters, and counting.
First sections of glass are installed:
(images credit: Imre Solt, Dubai
Construction Update and Webshots - Dkysum)
Current size comparison with the Chicago's Sears
Tower:
Current stage in the construction process:
image courtesy R. Braddish, Nakheel
Properties
It will be interesting to see the planned
construction crane, perched on top of the last
concrete level - the highest crane location in
the world.
"The construction is getting close to uncharted
territories.
Now is a good time to start being scared."
(Skyscraperpage forum)
But the buyers are not scared:
- A 2 bedroom, 2 bathroom apartment has just
been sold by EMAAR on floor 188 for
$11,686,980 AED ($3,155,174 USD)
- The whole of floor 200 has just been
sold to a private bidder for $16,766,575 AED
($4,527,975 USD, which is not so expensive,
considering the hype. However, keep in mind that
top floor is going to be only 8 meters wide) It
also gives a hint that the building might exceed
the 200 floor limit.
The building will be resistant to earthquakes,
because of its relatively narrow "footprint".
"It is actually the case that smaller buildings
are more at risk if an earthquake happens. It is
all to do with what we call the frequency. If
you imagine a block on top of rows of marble,
the taller the block is the more rigid it is."
(source) The swing at the very top, however, can
be quite substantial.
(image courtesy by Fury, Skyscraperpage
forum)
(image courtesy ViperConcept, Germany)
(more pictures at Burj Dubai Skyscraper and
Dubai Online)
Frank Lloyd Wright's 1954 designs (for
comparison):
Compare the form, design and vision of this
never-built Frank Lloyd Wright's 1954 concept
with Burj Dubai:
(image credit: Delmars.com)
More after the jump...
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The Rest of Dubai is similarly
construction-crazed
The rising of the rest of the city is just as
exciting to watch. You've probably seen this
image of Dubai in 1990:
Well, the city skyline already approaches
Chicago-like density, and will be something to
behold in the next few years:
Here is what press has to
say about modern Dubai:
- "This is a city on crack"
- "It has more construction workers than there
are citizens of the city (note: over 80% of
Dubai's population consists of expatriates)"
- "More than one-third of the construction
cranes in the world are currently in Dubai"
- "Out of the 160 tallest completed/approved
buildings in Dubai, only 3 were completed before
2000, and of those three, two were completed in
1999".
(images credit: BurjDubaiSkyscraper and
Skyscraperpage)
The Fabulous Dubai
Waterfront
Next door to Burj Dubai is a site for another
competitor for the "highest building" title: The
Al Burj might even end up taller than Burj Dubai
upon completion. The final height for either
tower is not released, being a closely guarded
secret.
images courtesy Nakheel Properties
The Al Burj tower:
And even if that's not
enough...
There are rumors, and even a confirmed statement
from the "Nakheel Properties" that another
titanic superstructure will be built in Dubai,
possibly eclipsing all currently proposed
high-rise projects in the world.
The Ultimate "Burj", or simply the Tower, the
240-story, one-kilometer-tall (3,281 feet) spire
would beat out the currently under-construction
Burj Dubai, which is slated to hit around 2,300
feet when complete in 2009.
"The main challenger looks likely to rise up
just a few miles from the Burj Dubai site.
"Nakheel Properties" confirmed to Time Out that
it is going to build a super structure somewhere
in the city that will be very, very tall"
Source:Time Out,Dubai.
Why build even bigger in Dubai? (Dubai is all
set to have SIX super-towers by the year 2015)
Well, because they have competition in Kuwait,
quickly coming up in the approval stages:
Mubarak Tower, Kuwait: 1001m, 250 floors.
The proposed skyscraper to dwarf Burj Dubai will
be located in Madinat al Hareer or "City of
Silk" in Kuwait. The interesting thing about
this project is that they don't even have the
city there yet. The city (actually four
inter-connected cities) is going to be built in
25 years.
"The City of Silk, described as "the new
Manhattan", will cover a 250 sq. km site in
Subiya, Northern Kuwait ? transforming the area
into a hub for up to 700,000 people.
The project will create a major new city at the
gateway to the famous Silk Route across central
Asia, and will be linked to Kuwait City by a new
bridge ? the Jabir Al Kabir"
City of Silk (actually four cities in one):
Size comparison with Burj Dubai:
(images credit: Eric R. Kuhne and
Associates)
The skyscraper could house 7000 people, but
would cost an estimated ?84bn to construct and
could take 25 years to complete. It will also
feature the world's first triple-decked
elevators to move people up and down
efficiently. The name of the 1001 metre tower is
actually "The Burj al-Kabir Tower" (The Tower of
1001 Nights)
Cities in the Desert
Asia and Middle East are the new "high-rise"
dream locations, bringing to mind fairy-tale
analogies with "cities rising from the desert",
"mirages" and "fata morganas" on the global
scale.
(image credit: Thomas Weinberger)
William F. Baker, a partner at SOM Properties
and the chief structural engineer of Burj Dubai,
has summarized the world-wide phenomenon of this
new type of 21st-century supertall proposals:
"If skyscraper construction had stopped in 1990,
one would say that the tallest skyscrapers are
made of steel, built in the United States, and
are office buildings. Today, one would say that
the tallest skyscrapers are made of concrete or
composite, are erected in Asia or the Middle
East, and likely to be residential." (source)
Look at this distribution of proposed and
under-construction super-tall skyscraper
projects in the world:
image by Al Nakheel Properties.
Asian projects definitely dominate the scene
(the globe on the right)
There are exceptions to the rule, of course:
For example, Buenos Aires, Argentina, is
considering to build a full-size 1000 meter
skyscraper, powered entirely by wind energy.
(See this page for more info)
Next few years are going
to be really exciting for skyscraper enthusiasts
of the world. First we'll see Burj Dubai
finished, then Al Burj construction will start,
the other mysterious titanic structure will be
unveiled, plus Kuwait's super-tall tower may get
underway.
Dubai is drinking the heady wine of unrestricted
architectural ambition, which in turn, tempts
every other well-funded government in the region
to participate in the party. We are really
hoping that hangover will never come. |
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