What to bring / 25.02.2022

What is lahta center. "Lakhta Center": "As future residents of Lakhta, we are the first to need a comfortable environment." General idea of the project

Beautiful St. Petersburg is hard to imagine as a city of skyscrapers, but high-rise construction is rapidly breaking into the city of Petra. The majestic Lakhta Center will soon become its first "swallow". At the same time, the Leningrad Tower will not be an ordinary skyscraper, but the second tallest among similar Russian and European buildings, bypassing the "Federation" in "Moscow City" and yielding only While the building is being built, there is time to learn interesting details about it.

General idea of the project

"Lakhta Center", "Lakhta Center" (both spellings are correct) - a public and business complex currently under construction. Its scale is explained by the fact that the headquarters of the largest Russian corporation Gazprom will become the key object of the skyscraper. Location of the complex - Primorsky The construction of the tower was started in 2012. Its full completion is planned for the third quarter of 2018.

The maximum planned height of the Gazprom tower in St. Petersburg with antenna/spire is 462 m. The top level of the very last floor will be 372 m above the ground. The mass of the building with filling will be 670 thousand tons. The complex will include not only the tower, but also a multifunctional building, which will be divided into the northern and southern parts of the atrium. The total area of the future building will be 400 thousand m 2 . How many floors are there in the Gazprom tower in St. Petersburg? The final number will be 87. The building will be serviced by 102 elevators.

Tower construction progress

Let's touch on the key stages of the construction of the Gazprom tower in St. Petersburg:

2013 - a foundation pit was dug for the building.
2014 - completion of the construction of the pit, the beginning of pile driving.
2015 - the completion of the so-called construction: the manufacture of a box-shaped foundation, reinforcement and concreting of the minus floors.
2015-2016 - erection of the first 50 floors of the skyscraper and 7 floors of the MFZ.
February 2017 - the 60th floor (260 m) was built.
April 2017 - work on the construction of the 67th floor (300 m).
May 10, 2017 - reaching a mark of 327.6 m and 78 floors, the skyscraper became the tallest building in the northern capital, "overtaking" the TV tower. The latter held this title for 55 years.

The concept of the Lakhta Center project

According to the project team, this tower, directed to the sky, like a rocket at the start, located on the shores of the Gulf of Finland, will form new standards of city life with its appearance and content:

developed social infrastructure;
modern offices that meet all global environmental requirements;
comfortable public spaces;
an abundance of green areas;
pedestrian and transport accessibility.

The main task of the so-called Gazprom tower in St. Petersburg is to rid the historical center of business and business activity, and at the same time the dominance of transport, transferring the focus of this activity to the outskirts of the city. The skyscraper will not only help the second capital to switch to a polycentric development model, but also attract significant investments, create new high-paying jobs, and create all the conditions for business development.

Architectural solutions

St. Petersburg is a city of contour lines, not skyscrapers. All of its historical high-rise buildings - St. Isaac's, Peter and Paul Cathedral - are the central points around which independent and integral ones lined up. bay, away from historical buildings.

The tower is designed to begin to form the "marine facade" of St. Petersburg. Its appearance does not at all conflict with the "face" of the city - the same theme of a lonely spire on the horizon, aspiration upwards, the contours of buildings, reminiscent of the outlines of the hull of ships.

The shape of the Lakhta Center, according to the architects, should visualize openness, lightness, freedom, the flow of spaces and the energy of the sea. They strive to give the complex the effect of weightlessness and organic unity with the surrounding city and nature. A special kind of double-glazed windows will help in this, which will allow the building to change its color depending on the mood of the sky.

What will be inside the complex

The popular name of the Lakhta Center - the Gazprom tower - is not entirely correct. The project of the "stuffing" of the complex impresses with its versatility:

It is planned to allocate only 43% of the total area for office space.
2.5 thousand m 2 will be occupied by a medical center.
7 thousand m 2 will be guaranteed to be provided to the children's scientific and educational center "World of Science", which will include lecture halls, laboratories, and an exploitatorium.
It is planned to open a planetarium in the building, in which 140 people will be able to simultaneously observe celestial bodies.
It is planned to build a transforming multifunctional auditorium designed for almost 500 people.
Floors 74-76 (330 m) are planned to be used as a two-story panoramic restaurant.
At an altitude of 357 m above the ground, on the 83rd-86th floor, there will be an observation deck equipped with powerful telescopes.
The MFZ will allocate 1.5 thousand m 2 for exhibition space.
An imposing amphitheater with 2,000 seats is also planned. Various water shows will be held on its stage with an area of almost 1.5 thousand m2.
A part of the complex will also be a covered pedestrian bridge, which will connect the space of the Lakhta Center with the park of the 300th anniversary of the city.

Other characteristics

Let's get acquainted with the interesting technical and design features of the Gazprom tower in St. Petersburg:

The skyscraper stands on 264 piles, each of which is 2 meters in diameter and 82 meters deep.
The reinforced concrete core is responsible for the stability of the tower.
The horizontal rigidity of the skyscraper is achieved by outrigger floors - there will be 4 pairs in total. The outriggers will keep the tower stable even if it loses 30% of its supporting structures.
Cold-formed glass technology is responsible for the innovative three-dimensional curvature of the facades of the complex.
The illumination of the Lakhta Center is light "pixels". Their color will depend on the season of the year.
Recycle waste will be an innovative garbage disposal.
Near the complex it is planned to open a metro station under the working name "Lakhta".

Finally, let's look at interesting facts related to the St. Petersburg tower:

Concreting of the bottom slab of the foundation of a skyscraper was included in the Guinness Book of Records as the most voluminous continuous pouring of concrete in the world. It lasted 49 hours, during which 19,624 cubic meters of concrete were poured.
400 thousand cubic meters of concrete will be spent on the construction of the entire complex.
The area of the glass surface of the tower will be equal to 77 thousand m 2 . The weight of each double-glazed window is more than 700 kg.
In July 2016, the skyscraper became the tallest building in St. Petersburg. He was able to achieve this title in just 10 months.
In August of the same year, Lakhta Center became the northernmost skyscraper in the world.

Surprisingly, the tallest skyscraper in Russia will be located in St. Petersburg, the city of contour lines. In addition to the height, the Lakhta Center project impresses with its versatility, well-thought-out concept and organic architectural solution.

"Lakhta Center" - A public and business complex under construction in Lakhta, the historical part of the Primorsky district of St. Petersburg, the key object of which will be the headquarters of the state concern Gazprom.

The complex includes a skyscraper and a multifunctional building, divided by an atrium into the South and North blocks. The total area of the premises is 400,000 m. It is planned to complete the project in the 3rd quarter of 2018.

The skyscraper became the northernmost in the world and the highest in Russia and Europe, surpassing the Moscow skyscraper "Federation Tower" by 88 meters, although in terms of number of storeys it is inferior to it and the 100-storey Grozny skyscraper under construction "Akhmat Tower". If we take the absolute height, then the Lakhta Center ranks second among the tallest buildings in Russia and Europe, second only to the 540-meter Ostankino TV tower. The height of the building is 462 meters with 87 floors, and 118 meters falls on a spire of metal structures weighing more than 2000 tons.

The architectural design of the completed Phase 1 complex, including the tower, was developed by the team of authors of CJSC "Gorproekt" under the leadership of the chief architect of the project, Philip Nikandrov, who was the co-author and chief architect of the Okhta Center project (2006-2010). The interior design of the complex is being developed by the European bureau Exclusiva Design Srl, which in 2014 won an open competition for the design of the interiors of the IFC's public areas.

According to the concept, the interior of the multifunctional complex Lakhta Center will be made in a futuristic style. The glazing of the tower will be smooth, without joints and edges. Thanks to this, an original optical effect will be achieved in the form of reflecting clouds rising along the wall of the building. Double-glazed windows are parallelograms and triangles (in the corners). There are no windows in the glazing because the building is air conditioned. Two buildings located on the sides of the high-rise dominant will be built with a height difference of 22 to 85 meters.

Maximum high point of the southern building will be further away from the tower, and in the northern one, on the contrary, it will be directed towards the tower and the city. In March 2017, the first three elevators of the future forty were launched. Between the elevators there will be interchange nodes from the lower zone to the middle one, and from the middle zone to the upper one. A shuttle is also planned, which will deliver passengers to the observation deck without transfers.

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"Lakhta Center":
what is it worth
for high-rise
frontiers

Partner project

Skyscrapers are the vanguard of the construction industry. Super high-rise buildings always require a special approach from their creators. In 2018, the construction of the Lakhta Center will be completed in St. Petersburg, which will become the tallest skyscraper in Europe. What technologies are used to build the St. Petersburg giant?

New Height of Europe

The public and business complex "Lakhta Center" is being built in the Primorsky district of St. Petersburg, on the coast of the Gulf of Finland. The headquarters of the Gazprom Group and Gazprom Neft will become its center, the other part of the area will be occupied by public spaces: a scientific and educational complex for children and youth, a planetarium, exhibition spaces, medical and sports centers, a multifunctional transforming hall and others.

The complex consists of four structures: a multifunctional building with an atrium, a stylobate (there will be parking and auxiliary facilities), the main entrance arch and a skyscraper 462 meters high. It is he who will become the highest not only in Russia, but throughout Europe. The Lakhta Center Supertoll will outgrow the current European record holder, the Federation Tower in Moscow City, by 88 meters, and will be in 11th place in the world high-altitude rating.

Construction site in the swamp

There is an opinion that Petersburg is built on viscous soils, and it is impossible to build skyscrapers here. Experts answer: you can build anywhere, but you need a good calculation. The construction of the St. Petersburg supertoll was preceded by a year and a half of engineering and geological research. The authors of the project studied the geological, geodetic, ecological, historical and cultural features of the site.

It turned out that weak soils make up only the upper layer. Under it lies the Vendian horizon - these are the oldest clays, which are 635-540 million years old. As strong as rock or concrete, these clays provide excellent support for a skyscraper. But getting to them is not easy: on the way, construction equipment has ice age deposits in the form of giant boulders and sandy loam with gravel. A complex of studies, calculations and full-scale tests became the basis for creating the Lakhta Center design.

Device: base

Piles and protective wall

From pressure and water in the upper soil layers, the foundation is protected by a five-sided underground structure along the perimeter of the base of the skyscraper. Its height is 30 meters, the length of the walls is more than 300 meters. Inside the pentagon, 264 piles are installed, going to a depth of up to 82 meters. Their diameter is 2 meters. These are the widest piles in the world. The piles of the foundation of a skyscraper are not hammered, but created right on the spot - in the ground. The shaft is drilled out, then the reinforcement frame is installed and poured with concrete.

Foundation

The foundation of the skyscraper rests on piles. It consists of three slabs separated by ten radial walls that radiate "beams" from the core. The most famous of the plates is the lower one, 3.6 meters thick. It was she who got into the Guinness Book of Records: builders laid 19,624 cubic meters of concrete in the base of the building in 49 hours. Moreover, the uniqueness of the slab is not in the physical size, but in the technique that provides the necessary bearing capacity with the optimal dimensions of the structure.

More about the record at the Lakhta Center site

Each pile under the tower is a separate complex engineering structure as high as a 30-story building. Control over its construction is a whole system, including video monitoring cameras lowered into the shaft and ultrasonic sensors installed in the reinforcement of the pile frame to determine the density and absence of voids.

Pressure test

The weight of the Lakhta Center tower will be 670,000 tons, putting pressure on the ground of a relatively small area. Under pressure, the soil will compact, and the skyscraper will settle - like any other building. The main task is to ensure that this draft passes evenly and the building does not deviate from the vertical. To monitor the behavior of the soil, underground structures and their interaction, a geomonitoring system has been created that combines 4800 sensors.

The sensors are located both in the ground and in all elements of the underground structures of the tower. So, 95 sensors “monitor” vertical displacements, 40 - the pore pressure of the soil, 336 measure the deformations in piles, 10 - the pressure under the base of the foundation, 2136 - the dynamics of forces in the foundation structures. All sensors are integrated into an automatic system. After the construction of every five new floors of the tower, the system issues a full report on what is happening with the soil, piles, and foundation. Such knowledge is useful not only for builders, but also for scientific research.

Vertical management

The sediment can pass evenly. But after all, the building itself can be built with a slope. This will not be surprising at a height of almost half a kilometer: an uncorrected deviation of 1 mm at the bottom will lead to a deviation of 1 meter at the top. "Lakhta Center" cannot afford a strong deviation: a skyscraper is stable "on a slope" only if it is specially designed this way (for example, Capital Gate is the building with the largest slope in the world: at 160 meters in height - 18 degrees of heel). The maximum deviation of the Lakhta Center core allowed by the project is 6 millimeters for all 462 meters. And the goal is to shift the deviation delta to zero, although in world practice no one has yet managed to reach absolute zero.

How can the St. Petersburg supertoll not turn into the Leaning Tower of Pisa?

There are examples of buildings in the world that successfully exist in a state of deviation from the vertical by meters. For example, the church of 1382 in Bad Frankenhausen: the deviation of the spire from the vertical is 4.45 meters with a “growth” of 25 meters.

Device: construction

A skyscraper cannot simply be built "as long as there are enough bricks." There are various systems that ensure the stability of super-tall buildings. At the Lakhta Center tower, it consists of a core, outriggers and load-bearing columns along the perimeter of the building.

It is a "pipe" with a diameter of 24.5 meters with a reinforced concrete wall thickness of 0.8 meters. Responsible for vertical stability.

Outriggers

The outriggers located on the technical floors consist of an annular beam around the core and diagonal metal trusses and columns extending from it. These elements transfer forces from the core to the outer columns and reduce the support moment at the bottom of the building, as well as impart horizontal rigidity - for example, they dampen the swaying of the tower from the wind. There are five outriggers in the Lakhta Center tower, of which four have the form of double floors, and the fifth is atypical, in the form of a powerful reinforced concrete "washer"

Made of composite materials - steel core with reinforced concrete shell. This solution was applied for the first time in civil engineering in Russia. Thanks to him, the cost of columns is significantly reduced, and the construction time

reduced by 40%, other things being equal.

Twisted shape

According to the creators, the Lakhta Center tower was conceived as a modern interpretation of a high-rise dominant that stands out against the background of the traditional horizontal building of St. Petersburg. Its "brothers" - the spire of the Peter and Paul Cathedral, the Admiralty Needle, the dome of St. Isaac's Cathedral - adorn the city center, while the new supertoll will become an organizing element in the rapidly developing Primorsky district. The new skyscraper will play the role of the main focus of the business space that will appear on the line of the city's "marine facade".

“The shape of the building symbolizes the energy of water, the flow of spaces, openness and lightness,” the authors of the project explain. – The effect of weightlessness and maximum fusion of the future complex with the environment will be enhanced by the use of a special type of glass, due to which, depending on the time of day, the high-rise building will change color, which will create the feeling of a “living object”.

Device: facade

The Lakhta Center tower twists 90 degrees around its axis. In the construction of such a building there are certain features. For example, due to expansion, contraction and "torsion", all 189 thousand components of the tower's metal structures differ from each other (strictly speaking, only two are identical). Facade elements also differ in shape and curvature: 16,505 panels cover an area of 72,500 square meters, while 71% of the double-glazed windows differ from each other in size and geometry. The size of each double-glazed window is 2.8 by 4.2 meters, weight is 740 kilograms. To service such a whimsical structure, a special facade maintenance system (abbreviated SOF) has been developed. With its help, the facades will be kept clean and, if necessary, repaired.

How to collect 189,000 parts and never make a mistake?

A vision for the future

Conquering heights is always a matter of having the appropriate technology. Elevator, ventilation, electricity - at one time it was skyscrapers that were the first to experience all these "novelties". After a successful start, the production of technologies became massive: they moved from the category of exclusive goods to the category of minimum standards in the construction of typical housing and public buildings.

The construction of skyscrapers is due to the development of modern lifting construction equipment, the invention of building stability structures, the introduction of new fire safety technologies, modern high-strength building materials. High-rise construction is an area where an order for high-tech solutions is formed, which will then move to other areas of our life.

"Walking" mechanisms for the construction of a skyscraper

St. Petersburg "Lakhta Center" is actively introducing technologies - something for the first time in the regional and Russian construction market, something - in the world. The significance of this construction project for the construction industry can be assessed later, but it is already clear how the environment is changing: joint production enterprises appear, qualified personnel grow, suppliers use new technical solutions - this is how new heights in quality standards are mastered.

They prepared in advance for pouring the bottom plate, because it is impossible to “remake” the work. The members rehearsed everything they could. For example, 13 concrete supply plants trained in the manufacture of a concrete mix according to a unique recipe until they reached its absolute identity.

The pouring speed was more than 400 cubic meters per hour, and the mixers made more than 2,450 trips. The process was organized so that the event locals learned from the media - there was no additional traffic jam on the busy Primorsky highway, no noise from the construction site.

The deviation delta is monitored by surveyors. They have seven systems of equipment (optical and laser) in their arsenal, duplication helps to double-check the instrument readings. Three of the seven geodetic systems are presented in Russia for the first time, but have managed to prove themselves well at the world's leading construction sites.

World geodetic premiere - a pulsed high-speed laser scanner with a two-axis compensator. The device is used for the first time in the construction of a skyscraper. With its help, the builders of Lakhta Center check the position of metal structures inside the concrete environment during the manufacture, for example, of composite columns with a steel core inside the concrete structure.

To maintain the core in a strictly vertical course, a "space" technology is also used - the Trimble 4D Control geodetic device. It uses a satellite signal and a system of geosensors installed at the construction site. With the help of GPS and GLONASS readings, the system determines the exact coordinates of the core and the displacement delta, which is constantly corrected based on the received data.

BIM is used for assembly, a relatively new technology for Russia. It is a virtual three-dimensional model of the building that combines all the data of the project documentation. When adding a time dimension, a virtual technology for erecting an object is built: projects for the organization of construction, work performance, supply logistics. In Lakhta Center, one more application was added to the standard use of the model. Due to its complex geometry, the tower is assembled from metal structures, each of which has a single possible mounting location. The correctness of the assembly is controlled, including with the help of BIM. The structures delivered to the site have barcodes associated with the BIM model. The part code clearly indicates its installation location in the overall design.

Builders say about the St. Petersburg Supertoll that it is “handmade”. We are talking about the uniqueness of solutions, and as for labor, they automate everything that is possible. For example, for the construction of the core, a “sliding” (automated) formwork system is used.

Formwork is a form for concreting formed by two rows of panels, the space between which is the future wall of the core. Concrete is poured between the shields and hardens.

Ordinary formwork needs to be loosened, rearranged to a new place and reassembled - a huge waste of time and productivity. And the automatic one, as the concrete is poured, “moves” with the help of hydraulic jacks.

Such self-propelled tools are very popular at the Lakhta construction site. The wind protection on the tower works according to a similar principle - its panels slide after the formwork. The "walking" mechanisms include a crane in the core of the tower - the first of its kind in St. Petersburg.

Now let's see how they build IGLOO GAZPROM

The beginning of the whole story was laid by the project of the Okhta Center complex, or Gazprom City. The complex with a 396-meter skyscraper was planned to be tied to the Neva again - it was supposed to rise on the cape, which is formed by the Neva and the river Okhta, which flows into it. On the opposite side of the Neva is the famous Smolny Institute, which was once the headquarters of the Bolsheviks, and now serves as the residence of the governor of St. Petersburg. The project then made a lot of noise, mostly unenthusiastic. The glass needle of the skyscraper was radically out of harmony with the architectural style of the St. Petersburg center, while creating a new high-rise dominant, arguing with the spiers of the Admiralty and the Peter and Paul Cathedral. Such intervention in the historical low-rise urban landscape seemed blasphemous to many.

In the end, the Okhta Center became the Lakhta Center: the construction of the Gazprom skyscraper, now 462 meters high, was transferred to the northern coast of the Gulf of Finland. There is no urban development nearby, and the historical center is as much as 9 km away, so the “needle” will no longer invade the recognizable outlines of old St. Petersburg. The complex of a high-rise building, an auxiliary building and a vast recreational area is planned to be completed in 2018, and then…

Is there any practical sense in the construction of such tall buildings where there seems to be no shortage of land? Of course, in Lakhta there is no crowding of American downtowns, but architecture is not always designed to fulfill a utilitarian function. Sometimes its task is to create symbols, objects of attraction. Historically, temples, which were supposed to rise above the surrounding buildings, became such centers of attraction. There was no other meaning than symbolic. When elevators appeared, and cities began to grow rapidly, high-rise buildings became leaders and dominants. "Lakhta Center" will meet those going to St. Petersburg cruise ships and ferries, like the Statue of Liberty in New York Bay, it will become a new symbol of the city, and this is precisely its main aesthetic task. So say the authors of the project.

Even those who are not strong in geography probably remember: a city built in the delta relies on loose, water-soaked soils. Everyone remembers a branch of the St. Petersburg metro that was torn apart by a quicksand for almost a decade. Unlike textbook Manhattan, which is essentially a bare rock, in the St. Petersburg region, a granite shield lies below 200 m, and it is unrealistic to lean a building on it. How to build a skyscraper here? It turns out that from the point of view of geotechnics - the science of soils - there are no monstrous difficulties in this case. In Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, where two twin super-skyscrapers were being built, the situation was even worse: the buildings stand on 120-meter piles. Of course, it is too difficult to lean on the rocky ground in Lakhta - this would require piles of an unprecedented length in world practice, so one has to use those that hold the building due to friction. The upper layers of the soil are very loose, but already below 30 m, quite hard Vendian clays begin, and the piles are held securely in them.

The traditional construction of the foundation of a skyscraper is an array of piles, on which a powerful slab rests. In principle, something similar has been done in Lakhta, but the foundation of the St. Petersburg skyscraper will have its own characteristics. It is a box-shaped structure buried in the ground to a depth of 17 m. Thus, the building will be, as it were, “drowned” in the ground, which will serve to more evenly distribute the weight of the structure and help to avoid heavy settlement of the skyscraper in the future.

The outer boundary of the foundation is a wall in the ground (in terms of a regular pentagon, or pentagon). It is not a supporting element, but it protects the power part of the foundation from soil pressure, and most importantly, from groundwater seepage. A pit is dug inside the wall in the ground, and so that the wall does not collapse, it is gradually strengthened with four reinforced concrete structures located one above the other - the so-called spacer disks. When the pit is ready, the heads of the pre-installed piles are exposed. There are 264 piles, and the length of the most powerful of them is 82 m. At the bottom of the pit, a concrete slab resting on the heads is poured, and reinforcement is already mounted on it for the main supporting structure - the lower foundation slab. The designers did not have a shortage of space, and therefore they were able to support the building on a significant foundation in order to ensure maximum stability.

Photo 2.

Photo 3.

The tragedy of the WTC towers in New York, and especially the terrible picture of their collapse, is so clearly engraved in the memory of each of us that the question “what will happen if ???” arises quite naturally, as soon as it comes to a new high-rise structure. It should be remembered here that the main customer of the complex is Gazprom, and we can say that this building is of strategic importance for our economy.

That is why the task was set to ensure the highest safety standards. In principle, the skyscraper will be built according to a well-known scheme: a cylindrical reinforced concrete core, floors, columns along the outer contour. The WTC towers had approximately the same design. These were strong buildings, designed to be hit by a Boeing 747, but the destruction of some power structures of the outer contour led to the progressive destruction of others, a domino effect was obtained, and as a result, the skyscrapers collapsed. The high-rise building of the Lakhta Center is designed in such a way that it can rest on one core. You can blow up all ten columns along the outer contour, but even then the skyscraper will stand. This is a real fortress, which, according to the calculations of the architects, must survive for many decades.

The stability of the structure is served by a special scheme for redistributing the load of the outer contour of the building to the core. Every 16 floors, ten powerful consoles depart from the reinforced concrete core - a kind of hanging foundations, on which the building section will additionally rely. There are four such outrigger levels in the skyscraper.

As a result, Lakhta Center will have a safety margin unique among buildings of this kind, significantly exceeding established international standards.

The reluctance to save on safety does not mean that the idea of increasing the efficiency of the structure and reducing operating costs is completely alien to the authors of the project. On the contrary, given that it is building a building “for itself”, it is very important for Gazprom to maintain its commitment to modern energy saving technologies, especially in the unkind St. Petersburg climate. For example, the building will receive a double facade, that is, between two glazing strings there will be an insulating layer of air. In the heating system, such highly economical devices as infrared emitters will be used. In addition, the heat accumulated in the building from working computers and other office equipment will be removed and then used in the heating system. The air conditioning system has its own characteristics - it is based not on the usual scheme for removing heat from the room to the outside, but on cold accumulators located underground, which can produce up to 1000 tons of ice per night, and then give it cold to the rooms during the daytime. Presence sensors will also become widespread everywhere, which, when no one is in the room, will turn off the lighting devices.

But will the building be habitable from the lowest floors to the highest point? High-rise buildings built for purely commercial purposes are often inhabited from top to bottom, and there are no "frills". However, if we are talking about a symbol, whether it is the Moscow State University building on Sparrow Hills in Moscow or the Burj Khalifa in Dubai, a significant part of their height is an uninhabited spire, designed to give the building an aesthetic completeness. Despite the fact that the height of the Lakhta Center skyscraper will be 462 m, all inhabited floors will be below 400 m. Everything above is an architectural element that will help the building serve as a city landmark and decorate the sea gates of St. Petersburg.

The skyscraper in Lakhta will receive a helical shape, that is, its facades will be distinguished by a rather complex and asymmetric surface. Of particular interest is the use of cold-formed glass, which makes it possible to make the glazing absolutely smooth. Together with a double facade, this will give unusual optical effects - for example, the reflection of clouds, as if rising diagonally along the wall of the building.

Photo 4.

The construction of a business and public center in Lakhta is not only an attempt to turn St. Petersburg to the sea with a “human face”, but also a desire to follow the centrifugal trend in modern urban planning. New business parks are being created far from dense urban development, they have large territories, and there are no problems with parking. The flow of cars to the Lakhta Center will always be in antiphase with the flow that moves to the city center in the morning and rushes to the outskirts and suburbs in the evening. In this way, the historical center of St. Petersburg will be partially unloaded, and business activity in the Lakhta Center, on the contrary, will be activated. Of course, the accessibility of the Lakhta Center will be ensured not only for motorists, but also for those who use public transport: the complex will be connected with the city center by metro line.

However, the purpose of Lakhta Center goes far beyond the task of providing the city with additional office space. In the skyscraper and in the auxiliary building, the project provides not only business premises, but a large Center for entertaining science for children, conference rooms, exhibition spaces, sports and medical complexes, cafes, restaurants, shops and even an ultra-modern planetarium. The vast adjacent territory will accommodate squares, parks, walking paths and an amphitheater overlooking the Gulf of Finland.

It can be said that the history of the Lakhta Center is connected not only with urban planning and architecture. After all, it so happened that the clash of interests of a large national corporation and the aspirations of the civil society of the Northern capital regarding the Okhta Center did not lead to the triumph of one side at the expense of the other, but to a new quality and a new stage in the development of St. Petersburg.

Photo 5.

The construction of a high-rise building in the delta of a full-flowing river is a difficult task, but not impossible. The upper layers of the soil have quicksand properties, however, at a depth of 30 m, the so-called Vendian clays occur, which are comparable in hardness to natural stone. In this regard, it became possible to replace the slotted foundations with bored piles, which will hold the building not due to support on the rock, but due to the force of friction. Piles, the most powerful of which reach a length of 82 m, are not driven, but installed. Such piles are called bored: first, a well is drilled, then a casing pipe is lowered into it (so that the walls of the well do not crumble), reinforcement is installed inside the pipe, and then concrete is poured.

Photo 6.