Recently Fairport Construction has been looking at some of the greatest construction feats throughout recent history, it would only be fair to mention the tallest freestanding structure to date. This is of course The Burj Khalifa in Dubai. This massive structure stands at an astonishing 829.8 metres (2,722 feet), the building contains 163 floors, 57 elevators and 8 escalators.
The decision to construct such a building has been reported to have been made by the government, this was to diversify its economy from being solely focused on oil.
The design of the building was a huge factor as building a structure so tall would obviously be affected by forces such as wind, this coupled with the motion of the upper floors would become dominant factors in the structural design. To test the designs of the building and how it would stand up to the elements; a wind tunnel was built to replicate the equivalent winds that Dubai could face with a scale model of The Burj Khalifa. This showed flaws in the design and so slight tweaks in the design were made to make the structure as stable as possible. Wind tunnel tests were also conducted on the three primary tower cranes to ensure that they would not be affected by the winds at such a height.
The construction of The Burj Khalifa began on the 21st September 2004. With the immense preparation that had taken place on this structure and the steps taken to minimise risk, the construction of the structure did not have any major setbacks or problems. There was a delay in the completion caused by a re-design of the interior of the rooms as so much time had passed in the construction process, the rooms had another makeover to their original design. There was also the controversial choice in labour. The Burj Khalifa construction teams where mainly formed of south Asian workers and it was reported that there may have been mistreatment towards them.
The Burj Khalifa was finally completed on the 1st October 2009 and opened 4th January 2010, this included an official launch ceremony where over 6,000 guests attended as well as major media news outlets. There were several large television screens placed around ‘Downtown Dubai’ so all of the locals could watch the crown jewel of the area be unveiled. The ceremony display consisted of 10,000 fireworks, lighting projections on and around the tower, and light and water effects in front of the tower. This was a great achievement that needed to be celebrated, The Burj Khalifa is not just the tallest building in the world, it is taller by over 150 metres of the next highest building. The cost of The Burj Khalifa is estimated to have cost $1.5 billion. The cost of buying an office space in this mega structure reached up to $4,000 per square foot.
Ever since its unveiling back in 2010 The Burj Khalifa has constantly developed by adding base jumping facilities to the tower as well as winning 29 awards to date.
What do you think of this monumental structure? Have you been to The Burj Khalifa? Let us know in the comments below.
