Burj Khalifa: facts about the world's tallest building
January 8th 2010 00:05
The Burj Khalifa, which officially opened in Dubai this week, is the world's tallest building and the highest structure ever made by man. The following list of facts has been gathered from a variety of sources.
Burj means tower in Arabic.
Construction began in 2004 and took 1,325 days.
The building cost US$1.5 billion, but is part of a $20 billion, two square-kilometre (490-acre) development called Downtown Dubai which is described by the developer as a "new urban masterpiece".
The official height is 828 metres (2,717 feet), a staggering 328 metres higher than the world's second-highest tower, the 500-metre Taipei 101 in Taiwan, and 275 metres taller than Toronto's 553-metre CN Tower, which had been the tallest man-made structure on Earth since 1976.
The owner is Dubai-based developer Emaar Properties. The architect was Chicago-based Skidmore, Owings, and Merrill. The primary contractor was South Korean construction company Samsung C&T, which also built Taipei 101 and Kuala Lumpur's Petronas Twin Towers
The Burj Khalifa's 200 storeys house a hotel, residential apartments and retail space. Prices for the apartments when they went on sale in March 2009 reached US$37,500 per square metre. If you want one you're too late, they're all gone.
The building contains 330,000 cubic metres of concrete, 39,000 tonnes of reinforced steel, 103,000 square metres of glass in 24,000 windows, and 15,500 square metres of embossed stainless steel.
It weighs 500,000 tonnes.
It has 57 elevators.
It has the world's highest observation deck, highest swimming pool, highest elevator, highest restaurant and highest fountain.
The contract to clean the 24,000 windows was won by an Australian company named Cox Gomyl. All the windows will get washed once every three months.
The Armani Hotel in the tower is described as an "ultra-luxe seven-star" hotel. It self-proclaims itself as the world's most luxurious hotel, which will annoy the folks at the Burj Al-arab, Dubai's famous sail-shaped hotel which makes the same claim.
At the Armani Hotel, you can slum it in one of the 160 guest rooms down on levels five through eight, or you can go upmarket in the suites on floors 38 and 39, where room rates are probably measured in oil tankers rather than mere money.
The name of the building was Burj Dubai until the global economic crisis became a cash crisis for Emaar Properties. The company was heading for collapse until a white knight appeared. He was Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed al Nahyan, current President of the UAE and ruler of Abu Dhabi. With his help, Emaar survived, and Burj Khalifa was renamed in gratitude.
Although there are 200 storeys, 40 are uninhabited and unnumbered. The top floor is therefore the 160th floor, immediately below the spire. It is full of mechanical stuff. Floors 156 to 159 are used for communication and broadcast purposes and 155 is more mechanical stuff. The best people can do is floors 139 to 154, which house corporate suites.
www.burjdubai.com, Reuters, abc.net.au, Wikipedia, www.dubai-architecture.info
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