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)


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.


What comes up, must... come up in Dubai, of course

No other place in the world is so saturated in architectural "creative juice" right now, as Dubai. Powered by the government's idea of creating some kind of Flash Gordon /Buck Rodgers tourist trap (and by the injections of pure cash, of course), the place sports ridiculous amount of mind-boggling projects, part of which we covered in The Rotating City and Burj Dubai Highest Building articles. Now's the time for a quick overview of what's already on the plate, and what's coming on the (decidedly gourmet) Dubai's architectural menu.

First, projects already (even if partially) built:

Palm Islands

The largest artificial islands in the world, built by (who else?) Dutch engineers, who perfected their dredging technology in their constant battle for ground with the rising sea. Three of these islands are large enough to see from space, and swanky enough to attract wealthy buyers from all over the globe.





The World Islands

Variation on the Palm islands idea, except in a (slightly cheesy, we think) world map form. Every little "island" will cost in the neighborhood of 20-30 million dollars, and there will be 300 of them.






(images credit: Nakheel Properties)

"Hydropolis" Underwater Hotel

The world's first, and a planned celebrity magnet. German company Hydropolis is going to build the modules, of which there will be three: the land station, where guests will be welcomed, the connecting tunnel, which will transport people by train to the main area of the hotel, and the 220 suites within the submarine leisure complex. (source)





Land Station:


"Dubailand" - which will be twice the size of Walt Disney World Resort in Orlando (largest amusement park collection in the world) is going to be the subject of a separate article.

Now real fun begins; these are the projects that just recently came to our attention:
(One page on the internet is called "Dubai is nuts". I'd say, Dubai is going "triple nuts" with whipped cream and a cherry on top)

1. LAS VEGAS ARAB STYLE: THEMED HOTELS PARADISE

Bawadi Section of Dubai:
- spans a stretch of over 10 km
- houses 31 themed hotels, including the largest hotel in the world.
Las Vegas on steroids, built in half the time, with probably wilder (or tackier?) design sense. Although, it might turn out interesting, if tastefully done.







Asia Hotel - the biggest (of course) hotel in the world:





Lagoon Hotel - the World's Cthulhu Headquarters:


(images credit: Skyscraperpage)

Trump Tower Dubai:



2. THE JEWEL OF DUBAI: THE ROTATING TOWER

I like this one the most. Morphing into mesmerizing shapes under the sublime light of the moon, wooing romantic couples with a whir of the wind turbines, making the tenants slightly dizzy by the graceful rotation of their bedroom's scenery - this is radical enough to attract scores of tourists, if successfully built.

Read this article for more info.











Wind turbines will be placed between the levels:

• 68 floors
• built by Italian company "Dynamic Architecture"
• every floor is controlled independently by the owners: (have a sunset in your window when going to bed, and see the sunrise when waking up)
• 58 wind turbines can produce up to 300 kWatt of energy (fully powering not just the tower, but a few surrounding city blocks as well)
• One tower can produce $7 million dollars worth of energy a year.
• Amazing construction technology: build the "stem" first, and then - starting from the top! - string the modules along the spiral grooves.(1 floor every 3 days, with only 90 workers needed, instead of 2,000)
• Modules are prefabricated and transported to the site by trucks.
  

(image credit: Dynamic Architecture)


3. DEATH STAR: CERTAINLY A PRACTICAL SHAPE

RAK Convention and Exhibition Centre Ras Al Khaimah:
Rem Koolhaas from "Office for Metropolitan Architecture" OMA in Rotterdam, Holland chose this form because of its effective use of space and inherent practicality. The center will house multiple hotels, residences and offices - all having individual balconies facing the central open space.







The circular openings in the sphere will allow enough sunlight to host an exotic garden inside:



The "Sphere" will be located immediately adjacent to the proposed NEW CITY (no less). Here is how the whole "Death Star/Satellite City" combination will look like:





Proposed new city - "RAK Gateway":




Images courtesy SOM and Emaar Properties.

To summarize this smorgasbord of architectural delights: The only thing going against Dubai seem to be that it's really a desert with an atrocious climate, that it's located in the seismically and politically volatile Middle East, that their government is technically running out of oil money (and real tourist money is yet to come) - and that there are way too many projected new cities in the region, that will need to be populated by whom? The tourist industry is huge, and lets hope these eye-candies will prove to be attractive enough for the volume of tourism UAE needs.

source : 1, 2

try , Jumaat, Jun 13, 2008 | 0 komentar ::

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