Studying the list of the most ambitious construction projects of the next decade, you understand that in the 21st century “size matters” more than ever. However, unlike the participants in the architectural superclub of past years, the leaders of the modern race have moved to Asia. The rules of the game are also changing. Now it is important not only to create a taller skyscraper, but also to equip it with the most environmentally friendly and high-tech of all that the construction industry is rich in. Better yet, change the surrounding areas to suit the needs of the high-rise residents, thereby creating a new city infrastructure. the site selected the most interesting building projects, arranging them in order of increasing height.

"Federation", Moscow

The Federation Tower is a complex of skyscrapers being built on the territory of the Moscow International Business Center. The complex consists of two towers built on one platform: the height of the East tower will be 96 floors, and the West tower will be 64 floors. The total “growth” of the structure together with the spire will be over 500 meters. Inside there will be offices, hotel apartments and restaurants.

One World Trade Center, New York

Construction of the new World Trade Center building was completed just a few months ago. At the request of the New York Police, the base of the building was made of concrete and additionally reinforced with steel columns. At 541 meters, the new World Trade Center became the tallest building in the Western Hemisphere.

Lotte World Tower, Seoul

Construction of the South Korean 555-meter skyscraper began in 2005 and is still ongoing. Deadlines, as often happens, are constantly being postponed, but it is already known that the 123 floors of the building will house shops, offices, apartments and a hotel. In addition, the top 3 floors will be given over to an observation deck with free access.

Goldin Finance 117, Tianjin

When construction of Goldin Finance 117 is completed in 2015, its height will be 596.6 meters. Which ensures the skyscraper from China takes No. 3 in the list of the tallest buildings in the world, after the Dubai and Shanghai towers. Unlike its “colleagues,” the skyscraper’s specialization is quite narrow—the 117-story giant will house hotels and offices.

Wuhan Greenland Center, Wuhan

The 606-meter height of the future Wuhan Greenland Center puts it in 4th place in the ranking of similar large structures. It is noteworthy that the famous architect Adrian Smith, who created the Burj Khalifa, which still holds the world record for height, is participating in the construction of the Chinese Center. The name of the 119-story WGC skyscraper is not in vain reminiscent of environmental friendliness; the project provides for ventilation with an “energy recovery” system, energy saving, use of “grey” water, etc. The building will house offices, hotels, luxury housing and a private club on the upper floors.

Shanghai Tower, Shanghai

According to the project, the super-tall building “Shanghai Tower” should reach 632 meters, overtaking the neighboring skyscraper of the World Financial Center. After completion of construction in 2014, the building will be used for a variety of purposes - from offices to fitness clubs. Each of the 128 floors will include an atrium with 360-degree views, a garden, eateries and seating areas.

Signature Tower, Jakarta

It is expected that by the end of construction in 2020, the height of the Indonesian skyscraper called Signature Tower will be 638 meters. At the same time, 6 tiers of the 111-story high-rise will be located underground. The building in the Sudirman Central Business District is intended for offices and a luxury hotel.

Seoul Light DMC Tower, Seoul

The 133-story Seoul Signal Tower is scheduled to open soon, in 2014. In addition to the fact that the 640-meter building will be the tallest in East Asia, the Light DMC skyscraper will be one of the most environmentally friendly in the world. Wind turbines, vertical gardens, solar panels and other “green” construction technologies will help him in this.

Ping An Finance Centre, Shenzhen

As of today, construction of the 115-story Pin'an International Financial Center has been suspended. It turned out that low-quality materials were used during construction. However, the project of a complex of two towers similar to the Empire State Building and the Chrysler Building in New York - 660 and 307 meters - will be resumed as soon as the ban is lifted. According to the plan, the main part of the financial center will be occupied by the offices of Ping An Insurance.

Kingdom Tower, Jeddah

The project's target completion date is 2018. The cost of construction of the “Royal Tower” is estimated at approximately 20 billion US dollars, which Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal from Saudi Arabia undertook to pay. The height of the 167-story building will be 1007 meters, which automatically makes it the tallest in the world. In addition to the construction of the colossal Kingdom Tower skyscraper in the desert, it is planned to create a comfortable settlement for 80 thousand inhabitants around it.

The 2011 Skyscraper Competition is an attempt to promote the vision of the infrastructure of our future by architects who have put a lot of effort and soul into their projects. Projects received awards based on the following criteria: use of new technologies, materials, programs; aesthetics and spatial organization; taking into account globalization and the digital revolution; adaptability and adaptability. The event was organized by eVolo Magazine. The competition jury selected among the participants those projects in which architectural and natural features were most successfully taken into account.

1. First place: LO2P, recycling center in Delhi (Atelier CMJNb Julien Combs, Gael Brule)
The LO2P skyscraper was designed specifically for New Delhi, the capital of India, which is characterized by high levels of pollution. This structure, reminiscent of the London Eye, is built from building material obtained from recycling old cars. Large-scale greenhouses of this design will serve as air filters. LO2P is also equipped with a filter system that absorbs suspended particles from the air, and waste heat and carbon dioxide from the processing center are used to grow plants, from which, in turn, biofuels are made.

2. Second place: Flat Tower (Johann Meskam, Paul-Eric Schirr-Bonnans, Xavier Schirr-Bonnans)
The Flat Tower is a high-density building shaped like a dome with pass-through skylights. The extensive surface of the dome is ideal for collecting solar energy and rainwater. At the lower level of the building there are places for recreation and entertainment, offices and living quarters are located in the upper compartments. The automated transport system provides communication between compartments of various shapes. This project was developed specifically for the industrial area of ​​the French city of Rennes, but can also be adapted to any other area.

3. Third place: New Hoover Dam (Wuhe-Shen Chua)
Today you can visit the Hoover Dam and enjoy the beauty from the observation deck, bridge or gallery, but one problem: all these places are located quite far from each other. The designer of this project combines all the main points of the dam in one structure, and also equips it with a vertical aquarium, which will finally win the hearts of tourists.

Honorary awards also received the following projects:
NoeTax: 3D Urban Network (Studio DMTW, Marc Antoine Damen, René Lierschaft and Anna-Maria Wiedekind)
This is a project of a three-dimensional urban network consisting of vertical and horizontal compartments. The building was built using a modular system, where each module represents a separate block or area.

PoroCity: Rehabilitation Mumbai (Khushalani Associates: Rajeev Khushalani, Thomas Kariat, Mihir Sangani)
Dharavi is one of the largest slum areas in the world. This project is an attempt to rehabilitate this area. The design is based on the rectangular Sierpinski pyramid. The structure is divided into blocks measuring 3 x 9 m, forming sections for public use with terraces facing the north side, infrastructure (hospitals, supermarkets, etc.), educational institutions, factories and offices. Instead of cars, elevators, movable sidewalks, escalators and funiculars moving in vertical, horizontal and diagonal planes are used as means of transportation.

Tower of the Dead (Lopez Balan, Elsa Mendoza Andres, Muaze Adrian and Hernandez Garcia)
This is a project for an underground vertical cemetery for Mexico City.

Fish Tower (Hsing-O Chang)
This project is a prototype of a vertical fish farm, the efficiency of which can exceed that of traditional farms by 30 times. The lower floor of this structure also houses a market and visitor center. Farms are designed taking into account the characteristics of the habitats and spawning of each species of fish. There is also a research bay located here.

Sports Tower (Sergei and Olga Prokofiev)
The sports tower is a vertical complex that combines all the variety of sports facilities.

RE:pH - skyscraper on the coast (Gary Kellett)
The design of this skyscraper is based on the idea of ​​reducing the acidity level of ocean waters by introducing fossilized coccolithophores into the water. The ideal location for this project is the south-east coast of England, where there are extensive deposits of coccolithophores (white chalk), stretching from the outskirts of London to the White Cliffs of Dover.

Iceberg Autonomy: Oil Refining Center (Akram Falimi)
Iceberg autonomy is an enclave, a “sea scraper” containing oil reservoirs and separators. This is a kind of floating water world.

Tourist city (Francisco Villeda, Hechan Park, Wouter Dons, Sandra Fleischmann)
This project is a group of megastructures created to combat the surge of urbanization in the city of Cancun (Mexico).

Root Tower: Thousands of Underground Plateaus (Enrico Tognoni, Federico Tinti, David Mariani)
Root Tower is a fantastic underground city! In essence, it is an “earthscraper” that functions through the use of underground and above-ground resources. The implementation of the idea of ​​​​creating an autonomous underground city can make it possible to grow an entire underground nation! The general structure of the structure is divided into 4 layers surrounding the central core. The first layer is located on the surface of the structure and includes places for recreation and entertainment, as well as food warehouses, agricultural fields, farms and greenhouses. The outer shell of the building is covered with photovoltaic sections used to collect solar energy. Wind turbines are located in separate sections. The second layer has about 60 residential levels, presenting a variety of residential areas for different types and sizes of families. The third and fourth layers contain offices, as well as special compartments for collecting and studying geothermal energy.

New York's 6th Ward (John Houser)
This area will occupy the space between 22nd and 14th streets and 6th and 7th avenues in New York. The grid structure includes stations, parks, residential buildings, offices, etc. An urban utopia!

Singapore port (Georgiy Kkhmaladze)
Already from the name of this project one can understand that this port will be created with the aim of expanding the financial district of Singapore. The designer places special emphasis on the use of resources such as rainwater, natural ventilation and sunlight. The walls of the skyscraper will be inclined at an angle of 20 degrees to the ground. Each villa in this building offers its residents two-storey apartments and a beautiful shaded private garden. The hotel and offices are located on the middle levels of the skyscraper, where the most extensive compartments are hidden.

Moonscraper (Louis Quinon)
It's time to move to the Moon, or more precisely, to the lunar crater Shackleton, located at the young pole of the Moon. I'm not kidding! This project will be implemented exactly there and, perhaps, in the future it will become your home.

Floating Olympic Village (Andrew Chow Wai Tat, Tao Huang, Xu Liang Chang)
This project represents inverted skyscrapers that will serve as an Olympic village, and will subsequently be transformed into a city floating above the ground, where offices, residential buildings, entertainment and recreation areas and infrastructure will be located. The prototypes of the design were the umbrella dome, rough and stalactites. The designers of the project see its implementation for the upcoming Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro.

Skyscraper at the North Pole: Cargo transhipment base (Borja Mugiro)
This project is proposed as a transportation center for the Arctic region. The multi-section skyscraper cuts through the Arctic ice shelf and serves as a warehouse for cargo from around the world.

Life on Demand (Benjamin Feenstra, Jelmer Frank Vigna)
We present to your attention a futuristic concept of delivering all kinds of goods and services directly to your doorstep, and you don’t have to leave it at all. Play golf? Please! The doctors? He is at your service! "Go to the cinema? Nothing could be easier! Just order and we will fulfill your every wish.

Waste collector (Agatha Sander, Tomek Kujawski)
This skyscraper is nothing more than a waste recycling plant located right in the city center! This project was developed specifically for the Huangpu area (Shanghai). The facility's processing capacity is 400 tons of solid urban waste daily. Recycling is clean, autonomous and does not require intensive land use.

Hotel of Hope: High Rise Transit Housing (Asaf Dali)
This project is intended for people who have lost their homes as a result of natural disasters or economic crisis. The external frame of the building allows you to set up a tent camp inside the building, as well as place all the necessary amenities there, such as showers, beds, etc. etc. The design also includes laundry rooms, storage areas and communal kitchens.

Vertical farm within the city (Yiking Jiang, Ying Jiang)
This is a project to build a skyscraper with parks and farms right in the center of Shanghai.

The Grain of Life (Osama Mohamed Elganam, Karim Mohamed Elnabawy, Mohamed Ahmed Khamis, Nesma Mohamed Abobakr)
We bring to your attention a plan of residential structures for the newly liberated Cairo. To create them, construction materials will be used from recycled waste from city landfills. The essence of the project is to construct a frame capable of accommodating various configurations of residential sections.

An inhabited mountain will save you from overpopulation (Anna-Maria Cimatu, Mariant Dendrow)
The inhabited mountain is a skyscraper designed to be built in one of the least suitable places for life on our planet, the Taklamakan Desert (northwest China). In this high-rise building, covering an area of ​​185 sq. m. meters, there are artificial lakes and residential complexes equipped with all necessary amenities. At the top of this structure, rainwater accumulates, which subsequently freely falls in cascades directly into the atrium of the skyscraper and irrigates the plants. It really is an oasis in the desert!

Tree of Life (Denis Sviridov and Anastasia Gudzenko)
The Tree of Life Project is a self-contained ecosystem designed specifically for open-pit mines around the world. The lower level of the structure, or its root, contains a power station for collecting geothermal energy, as well as a water purification system. The barrel provides structural strength. Pneumatic elevators are the connecting links between the sections of a skyscraper. In the crown of the Tree of Life there are residential sectors, offices, schools and entertainment centers. It also has its own agricultural fields and greenhouses, and uses solar panels and wind turbines.

Skyscraper Hydra (Miloš Vlastić, Vuk Djođević, Anna Lazović, Melissa Stanković)
Hydra is a skyscraper project based on hydrogen energy obtained through the process of electrolysis and stored in batteries. Energy can be transported through pipes, trucks or wires. It is also planned to obtain energy from lightning during a thunderstorm and store it in the same batteries. It is planned to create all the conditions necessary for the living of scientists' families.

Oil platforms are being transformed into energy-sustainable “sea scrapers” (Yang Wan Kim, Jun Jung Park, Jung Ha Park)
This is a project to transform oil platforms into energy-sustainable skyscrapers that will purify water. Modernized equipment is expected, including residential complexes.

Elastic Tower (David Gal, Jin Young Song)
Elastic cables are suspended from the top of the Elastic Tower and are attached to the perimeter of the rack at its base. The cables encircle the skyscraper, creating a diagonal configuration that prevents the structure from deforming.

Overhead Communication (Adam Nakagoshi, Thao Nguyen)
The three-level structure is designed to communicate between the upper floors of existing skyscrapers. The lower floors are for public use and are used primarily for transportation. The middle levels accommodate residential sections and offices, while the upper floors contain recreation and entertainment areas.

Roller Coaster: Vertical Amusement Park in Times Square (Dalho Young and Sungdong Jung)
The name of the project speaks for itself! Roller coasters are now in Times Square. This is a three-dimensional movement research project that has never been tested before and is designed to disrupt the conventional understanding of movement in the horizontal and vertical planes.

Barbed Wire (Hungbeom Cho, Jinkyu Park, Hong Sup Kim, Jiwon Kim)
The project was based on the idea of ​​the unification of North and South Korea, as well as the importance of preserving the inviolable reserves of the demilitarized zone. The project includes the creation of a museum and nature reserve where visitors can play sports and simply relax in nature.

Skyscraper-dump (Milorad Vidožević, Jelena Pukarević, Melissa Pilcher)
This is a project to remove debris from the Pacific Ocean by creating several underwater skyscrapers or floating islands. The structure of the buildings is based on self-supporting nodes, organized according to a functional hierarchy and communicating with 4 connecting cores supporting 3 main programs. There is a collector at the bottom of the structure, a processing plant at the middle level, and entertainment areas at the top.

Kinetic skyscraper (Viktor Kopeikin, Pavel Zabotin)
The kinetic skyscraper project includes three main programs, a geothermal plant (lower level), living quarters and offices (upper level), and a “solar” plant equipped with thousands of photovoltaic panels. Attached to the outer frame are kinetic living compartments, shaped like flower buds, which are also capable of opening and closing.

Chernobyl skyscrapers (Menggi Zhang)
This is a project to reconstruct the post-apocalyptic zone of the Chernobyl disaster on the territory of Ukraine.

White Cloud (Adrian Vincent Kumar, Yoon Kong Sung)
We present to your attention an air purification project. The buildings are “inverted” skyscrapers, at the base of which there is an extensive entertainment infrastructure, and at the top - residential complexes and offices. The thin membrane allows air to pass through, subjecting it to a purification process, and a constant mist washes over air particles trapped in the fabric-like material. The dust sifted out during the cleaning process is used in the manufacture of bricks at a factory located in the same structure.

United Skyscraper (Justin O)
The final height of this skyscraper has not yet been determined, because the project has been constantly being refined for 20 years! In this building one can trace changes in architectural styles over the course of 20 years.

Opened in 2010, the 828-meter Burj Khalifa tower in Dubai has become the tallest building on the planet, a symbol of the triumph of engineering genius. But she is not destined to be a record holder for long. In different parts of the Earth, preparations are already in full swing for the construction of even more tall and complex skyscrapers, each of which has a height at least a kilometer.

Sky City. China

The Sky City Tower, although it will have a height of just under a kilometer, is likely to be the first to break the Burj Khalifa's record of 828 meters from the base to the top of the spire. The project involves the construction of a stepped 838-meter tower in the Chinese city of Changsha, on 202 floors of which there will be residential apartments, hotels, educational institutions, hospitals, offices, and shops.

But what is interesting is not so much the record height of Sky City, but the incredibly fast pace of construction of this building. The Broad Sustainable Building company, which will build it, is known throughout the world for erecting high-rise buildings in just a few days. She plans to build this skyscraper in just 90 days plus 120 days of preparing the site for construction.

Construction of this skyscraper was supposed to begin in the summer of 2013, but has so far been postponed. True, preparatory work on the site where Sky City will grow is gradually underway.

Azerbaijan Tower. Azerbaijan

Azerbaijan also wants to build the world's tallest skyscraper. Growing revenues from the sale of oil and gas make it possible to implement very large social and infrastructure projects in this country, for example, the construction of the artificial Khazar Islands archipelago, the high-rise dominant of which will be the 1050-meter Azerbaijan Tower.

The construction of the archipelago began several years ago. Now the first public, residential and office buildings have grown on it, and the construction of the Azerbaijan Tower itself is expected to begin in 2015.

The project’s investors promise to put the Azerbaijan Tower building into operation in 2019, and to finish the entire artificial archipelago by 2020.

Kingdom Tower. Saudi Arabia

But still, most of the super-tall building projects are planned to be implemented in rich Arab countries. For example, Saudi Arabia lives with the idea of ​​​​building the tallest building in the world - they are haunted by the Burj Khalifa in the neighboring United Arab Emirates.

Construction of the Kingdom Tower skyscraper began in 2013 in the city of Jeddah. The height of this 167-story building will be just over 1000 meters. The exact data is still unknown - they will appear only after the facility is put into operation. Investors are afraid to make them public, fearing that someone will build a structure just a few meters higher and break the record.

Kingdom Tower will be the centerpiece of the Kingdom Center mixed-use development, a city of residential, office, hotel, retail and entertainment developments that will cost $20 billion.

Madinat al-Hareer. Kuwait

They want to build a kilometer-long skyscraper in Kuwait. In June 2014, a building project called Madinat al-Hareer, whose height will be 1001 meters, was finally approved there.

The name "Madinat al-Hareer" translates to "Silk City", a nod to Kuwait's glorious history as one of the world's silk trading centers. It was originally planned that this skyscraper would be built by 2016, but, apparently, this deadline will be postponed by at least two years.

Dubai City Tower. United Arab Emirates

Dubai is looking at the projects listed above with caution - in the very near future they could break the height record of the Burj Dubai skyscraper. But, on the other hand, in this city they don’t sit with their hands folded. There, work is in full swing to create a project for the world's first two-kilometer building.

The Eiffel Tower is used as the basis for the design of Dubai City Tower. But the dimensions of this Arab skyscraper will be seven and a half times larger than the French prototype. The height of the future tower will be 2400 meters.

The 400 floors of the Dubai City Tower will be connected not only by elevators, but also by a vertical train that can travel at a speed of 200 kilometers per hour and transport people from the bottom floor to the top in a matter of seconds.

ivansychev February 13, 2017 at 11:42 am

The tallest skyscrapers in the world

• Urbanism

In the previous article we discussed. Unfortunately, now none of the high-rise buildings erected in the country is among the ten tallest buildings in the world. Therefore, until the completion of the construction of the Lakhta Center (hello to the commentators of the previous article), we will talk about skyscrapers in the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, China, the USA, Malaysia, Hong Kong and Taiwan.

Willis Tower

The oldest of the dozen currently existing tallest skyscrapers in the world was built in 1974 in Chicago. Its height is 442 meters without the spire, with the spire - 527 meters. In the Russian-language Wikipedia, the Willis Tower ranks 11th, but this is somewhat incorrect: the Lakhta Center, which has already been ranked 8th in the ranking, will be completed in 2018.

Just think: in forty years, only nine skyscrapers in the world have surpassed the 108-story Willis Tower in Chicago, and in the United States this result was beaten only by the Freedom Tower, opened in 2014.

The design of the skyscraper was carried out by the architectural bureau Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, which later erected both the Freedom Tower and the tallest building at the moment - the Burj Khalifa in Dubai. The building was originally called the Sears Tower, and received the name Willis in 2009. The foundation of Willis Tower rests on concrete piles driven into solid rock. The frame consists of nine square "tubes" forming one large square at the base. Each such “pipe” consists of 20 vertical beams and many horizontal ones. All nine “pipes” are welded up to the 50th floor, then seven pipes go up to 66, by the 90th floor five remain, and the remaining two “pipes” rise another 20 floors. Exactly what it looks like is clear from a photograph from 1971.

A worker stands on the spire of a tower.

The Willis Tower in this photo is on the right, with two spiers.

Zifeng Tower

In Nanjing, China, the Porcelain Pagoda, a 78-meter-tall Buddhist temple, stood until the mid-19th century. Travelers described it as one of the wonders of the world. It was replaced by the Zifeng skyscraper.

Construction of the 450-meter high-rise Zifeng building was completed in 2009. It is the business center of the city. It houses offices, shops, shopping centers, restaurants and an observatory. In total - 89 floors.

Work on the construction of the tower lasted only four years. During the process, the project was changed: the tower could have a height of 300 meters. In China, where population density is extremely high, efficient use of land is essential. The triangular construction site was used to the maximum: the skyscraper has a triangular base.

The architects' idea was to interweave motifs of Chinese dragons, the Yangtze River and green gardens. The river is the vertical and horizontal seams that separate the glass surfaces. These surfaces themselves, according to architectural thought, are a reference to dancing dragons. Vegetation and pools were placed inside the building.

View of the city from a spire on a skyscraper.

Petronas Towers

In the capital of Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, skyscrapers called Petronas Towers were erected in 1998. The height of the two 88-story skyscrapers is 451 meters, including the spire.

The skyscraper was built in the “Islamic” style; each building is an eight-pointed star with semicircular protrusions for stability. The construction site was changed after geological surveys. Initially, one skyscraper was supposed to stand on limestone, the other on rock, so one of the buildings could sag. The site was moved 60 meters. The foundation of the towers is the deepest concrete foundation at the moment: the piles are driven 100 meters into soft soil.

Construction was complicated by an important condition: only materials produced within the country could be used. Strong elastic concrete, reinforced with quartz and comparable in strength to steel, was developed especially for the building. The mass of the skyscraper was twice that of similar steel buildings.

The bridge between the twin towers is secured with ball bearings. Rigid fastening is impossible, as the towers sway.

The elevators in the building are two-story models designed by Otis. One cabin stops only on odd-numbered floors, the second - on even-numbered floors. This saved space inside skyscrapers.

International Commerce Center

The 118 floors of the Hong Kong International Commerce Center house offices, a hotel and shopping centers. The height of the building is 484 meters. Initially, they planned to build a skyscraper 574 meters high, but the project was changed due to a ban on the construction of buildings higher than Mount Victoria.

Construction was completed in 2010, but there was no official opening: the building was already in full use by tenants. The 102nd to 118th floors are the highest above ground level hotel operated by the Ritz-Carlton. On the last, 118th floor, there is the world's highest swimming pool.

In 2008, China built the Shanghai World Financial Center, a neighbor of the Shanghai Tower. The height of the 101-story building is 492 meters, although 460 meters were originally planned. The building housed a hotel, conference rooms, offices, shops and a museum.

The building can withstand earthquakes up to magnitude seven and has fire-protected floors. After the attack on the Twin Towers in New York, the design of the building was modified so that it could withstand a direct hit from an airplane.

Thanks to its silhouette, the skyscraper received the name “opener”. The trapezoidal opening at the top was supposed to be spherical, but the Chinese government forced the design to be changed so that the building did not resemble the rising sun on the Japanese flag. Such changes made it possible to reduce the cost and simplify the design. This is how the upper part of the building was planned:

Here's what happened as a result:

Taipei 101

The capital of Taiwan, Taipei, boasts a skyscraper more than half a kilometer high. Together with the spire, the height of Taipei 101 is 509.2 meters, and the number of floors is 101.

For some time, Taipei 101 was also distinguished by the fastest elevators in the world: they rise at a speed of more than 60 kilometers per hour, or 16.83 meters per second. People rise from the fifth to the eighty-ninth floor in 39 seconds. Now the new record belongs to the Shanghai Tower.

On the 87th and 88th floors there is a 660-ton steel pendulum ball. This architectural solution was made not only to decorate the interior. The pendulum allows the building to compensate for gusts of wind. The durable but not rigid steel frame can withstand the strongest earthquakes. These solutions, together with a foundation of piles one and a half meters in diameter, driven 80 meters into the ground, made the building one of the safest in the world. On March 31, 2002, a magnitude 6.8 earthquake destroyed two cranes on the building, killing five people. There was no damage to the tower itself. But there is a theory that it was the skyscraper that activated the seismic activity.

Freedom Tower

World Trade Center 1 in Manhattan, New York, has surpassed its pursuer, Taipei 101, in terms of spire by 32 meters, although if we count the distance from the ground to the roof, the American Freedom Tower, on the contrary, is inferior to the Taiwanese tower by 37 meters. The height of the World Trade Center is 1 - 541.3 meters on the spire and 417 on the roof.

The building stands on the site occupied by the twin towers of the World Trade Center, destroyed in the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. When designing WTC1, past experience was taken into account, and the lower 57 meters were constructed using concrete instead of the standard steel structure.

The building officially opened on November 3, 2014. It is occupied by offices, retail spaces, restaurants and the City Television Alliance.

Royal Clock Tower

In Mecca in Saudi Arabia, in 2012, a complex of high-rise buildings, the Tower of the House, was built opposite the entrance to the al-Haram mosque, where the main shrine of Islam, the Kaaba, is located. The tallest building in the complex is the Royal Clock Tower Hotel, 601 meters high. It is designed to accommodate up to one hundred thousand pilgrims out of the five million people who visit Mecca annually. The Royal Clock Tower is the third tallest building in the world.

On the tower at a height of 400 meters there are four dials with a diameter of 43 meters. They are visible from any part of the city. This is the highest altitude clock in the world at the moment.

The length of the spire at the top of the hotel is 45 meters. The spire contains 160 loudspeakers for the call to prayer. The 107-ton crescent at the very top of the building has several rooms, one of which is a prayer room.

The tower contains 21 thousand flashing lights and 2.2 million LEDs.

Shanghai Tower

The second tallest skyscraper is located in China. This is the Shanghai Tower, a 632-meter-tall building adjacent to another skyscraper on the list - the Shanghai World Financial Center. Offices, shopping and entertainment centers, and a hotel were located on 130 floors.

The elevators in the building were developed by Mitsubishi Electric. Their speed is 18 meters per second, or 69 kilometers per hour. These are currently the fastest elevators in the world. There are three such elevators in the building, and four more two-story elevators reach a speed of 10 meters per second.

You shouldn't expect a beautiful view from the windows of a skyscraper. The building has double walls and has a second shell designed to maintain temperature.

The tower has a twisted design, which adds stability to combat wind.

From this angle, a spiral gutter is visible to collect rainwater used for heating and air conditioning.

Burj Khalifa

Opened in 2010 in Dubai, UAE, the Burj Khalifa tower has surpassed all existing skyscrapers and is still the leader in height.

The tower was designed by the architectural firm Skidmore, Owings and Merrill, which created the Willis Tower and 1 World Trade Center, which we previously discussed. The construction of the Dubai Tower was carried out by Samsung, which also participated in the construction of the Petronas Towers. There are 57 elevators in the building, they must be used with transfers - only one service elevator can go up to the top floor.

The tower houses the Armani Hotel, designed by Giorgio Armani himself, apartments, offices, shopping centers, fitness centers and observation decks with Jacuzzis. Indian billionaire B.R. Shetty completely purchased two floors, including the hundredth, at a cost of more than 12 million US dollars each.

As with the Petronas Towers, the world's tallest skyscraper developed its own special type of concrete. It can withstand temperatures up to 48 degrees Celsius. During construction, concrete was laid at night, adding ice to the solution. The builders did not have the opportunity to secure the foundation in the rocky soil, and they used two hundred piles 45 meters long and 1.5 meters in diameter.

If the Shanghai Tower has a gutter to collect rainwater, then in the case of the Burj Khalifa Tower such an approach is not needed: there is little rainfall in the desert. Instead, the building has a condensate collection system that can collect up to 40 million liters of water per year for watering plants.

During the filming of Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol, Tom Cruise decided to climb the tower to write Katie Holmes' name there and get a great shot.

Planned buildings

At the moment, there are only two building projects that can rank first in the ranking of the tallest skyscrapers in the world.

At 828 meters high, the Burj Khalifa seems less impressive compared to the Dubai Creek Harbor Tower project. Its roof height will be 928 meters - that is, it will already beat the current record by 100 meters. And the height of the spire will exceed a kilometer - it will reach 1014 meters. But this is not certain - the parameters of the building are kept secret. Like the Eiffel Tower, the Dubai Creek Harbor Tower will be open for World Expo 2020 if all goes according to plan. The foundation was laid on October 10, 2016.

urbanism

skyscrapers

architecture

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With hundreds of floors, these are always amazing structures that look prestigious and respectable. How are skyscrapers built and why do they do it? The feasibility of such decisions comes from the rapid growth of the population of the largest megacities on the planet. At the same time, developing a design for a building more than a hundred meters high is extremely difficult. Such a structure must be not only functional, but also safe. That is why today, to implement such projects, they resort to the use of the most innovative technologies.

What is the technology for building skyscrapers? What are the tallest buildings today? What innovations have been used recently in the construction of skyscrapers? We will try to answer these and other questions in our material.

Choosing a site for construction

How are skyscrapers built? The most important role in the implementation of the project is played by the choice of site for placing structures. High-rise buildings put much more pressure on the ground than standard residential buildings. It is for this reason that skyscrapers stand only on dense soil, which does not contain cavities, heterogeneous masses and water deposits. Buildings of impressive height contain a massive underground part, invisible to the eye of the average person. Obviously, laying complex foundation structures requires a thorough analysis of the nature of the soil.

Walls and load-bearing structures

Modern skyscrapers cannot be built from brick or concrete slabs. Such a structure would inevitably be quickly destroyed due to instability under the influence of natural factors.

As a rule, when constructing skyscrapers, they resort to the use of load-bearing, composite steel structures. The highest level of strength is used as a material for all kinds of floors.

Layout

The internal structure of skyscrapers is radically different from urban housing. The main emphasis here is on fire safety. After all, evacuating people from a building dozens of floors high in the event of an emergency turns out to be extremely problematic. Therefore, the internal space of skyscrapers is separated by special fire barriers. In this case, one reserve elevator in the building always remains connected to an uninterrupted power supply.

The newest skyscrapers are designed in such a way that in emergency situations people can take refuge on technical floors that usually sit empty. At the same time, all entrances to premises are most often equipped with double doors. This is done in order to prevent drafts that supply the flame with oxygen during fires.

Life support

Skyscrapers are usually equipped with systems that ensure economical energy consumption. Many modern buildings have solar panels. Productive pumps, which are installed every 10-15 floors, are responsible for the water supply. It is simply impossible to pump water hundreds of meters into the air in any other way. Well, we can’t help but mention the autonomous air conditioning systems.

Cost of projects

How much does it cost to build a skyscraper? Not long ago, Japanese engineers announced that they were planning to build a structure called “Fuji”, the height of which would reach an unimaginable 4 kilometers. The building design involves as many as 800 floors. The finished structure should accommodate about one million people. Solar panels will be used to provide the building with electricity. What is the cost of implementing the project? According to experts, the construction of Fuji will cost Japan between $300 and $900 billion.

As for the tallest building currently in existence, it is the Burj Khalifa tower in the United Arab Emirates. Its height reaches 828 meters. The cost of such a skyscraper reaches about 20 billion dollars.

The next tallest skyscraper is the Shanghai Tower, the construction of which was completed in 2015, costing its creators only 1.7 billion. The height of this building is 632 meters.

Tallest skyscraper in the world

In 2010, the city inaugurated one of the most impressive buildings in history. The tallest skyscraper in the world (828 meters) is called Burj Khalifa. The presentation of the tower was a pompous event. Thousands of onlookers gathered around the huge building. The ceremony was broadcast worldwide. A record 2 billion viewers simultaneously watched the action on television.

The project took 5 years to complete. During the course of the work, the plans that were responsible for financing changed several times. Architects regularly had to amend the structure's plan to maximize its height.

Despite all the efforts of the sheikhs, the Burj Khalifa, presumably, does not promise to remain the most impressive building in the world for long. After all, not so long ago the government of Saudi Arabia announced its own project, which should eclipse the famous tower in its grandeur. According to some reports, the height of the new giant called Kingdom Tower will be 1.1 kilometers.

Skyscrapers in New York

To this day, New York City remains one of the world leaders in the number of skyscrapers per unit area. The famous Empire State Building is a real tourist Mecca. The skyscraper is located in the financial center of the city at the intersection of Fifth and Thirty-fourth Avenues. The structure occupies an entire block and rises 448 meters into the sky.

Not so long ago, the tallest skyscraper in New York was the World Trade Center. The monumental structure consisted of two twin towers, each 541 meters high and 110 floors. However, in 2011 a terrible tragedy occurred. It is no secret that the famous skyscraper was destroyed by a terrorist attack and disappeared into history forever.

In 2005, the famous Rofeller Center appeared on the map of the metropolis. Funds for the construction of the skyscraper were allocated by successful businessman John Rockefeller, after whom the building was named. The building rises 259 meters above New York. At the top of the structure there is an observation deck, from which one of the best panoramas of the city opens. It is noteworthy that the observation tower on the roof of the building, implemented for tourists, does not have protective nets or gratings. This allows visitors to the site to enjoy simply fantastic views.

Innovative technologies

Currently, in the construction of skyscrapers all over the world, they are guided by the implementation of renewable energy sources in the project, the use of environmentally friendly, safe materials, and reducing the impact of the huge mass on the ground. Experts focus on possible vibrations of the structure and the impact of seismic phenomena on it.

How are skyscrapers built? First of all, designers resort to the use of composite materials. As a rule, the same patterns are repeated at all levels of the building. The use of composites reduces the overall weight of buildings by an average of 10%. Technology also makes it possible to significantly speed up the implementation of projects.

The most advanced technologies are used today in Asian countries. Here, they are especially concerned about the increased stability of high-rise structures, which is due to the high probability of natural disasters coming into play. Thus, a skyscraper located in Shanghai, according to experts, can maintain the integrity of its structures at wind speeds of more than 200 km/h, and can also withstand earthquakes of up to magnitude 7. This is achieved through the implementation of movable joints inside load-bearing steel columns. The presence of a swimming pool located on the 57th floor of a skyscraper has a huge impact on maintaining the stability of the structure. The latter allows the building to balance in space.

Not least of all in the construction of high-rise buildings is increased concern for the environment. Modern skyscrapers are increasingly playing the role of air filters that remove greenhouse gases and other harmful substances from the air. A striking example is the Bank of America building located on the island of Manhattan. Systems located in the walls of the building structure are capable of filtering polluted air and releasing it back into the space in a purified form.

The most in the world - the Burj Khalifa concentrates condensate, which is then released as a liquid to irrigate adjacent green spaces. Among other things, during the construction of the skyscraper, special grades of concrete were used that can withstand high temperatures that exceed 50 o C.

Finally

So we found out how skyscrapers are built. Not so long ago, some of the above projects seemed something futuristic and unattainable in the near future. As you can see, technology development does not stand still. Innovative solutions are quietly becoming part of our daily lives and are increasingly taken for granted.