Do you think it’s only here that they build grandiosely and expensively, and then don’t know what to adapt it to? Where there!
Is there some more North Korea, Canada, Cote d'Ivoire, Spain, Greece, Romania with their examples of multi-billions buried in the ground and poured into concrete.
Here are just a few expensive and in many ways unique construction projects, the maintenance of which costs owners a pretty penny, but neither the creators nor visitors need them.
Mirabel Airport
Montreal, Canada
Plans for a new airport for Canada's second largest city, Montreal, were first unveiled in 1967. And they were amazing: the largest area in the world (40,000 hectares), passenger traffic of up to 50 million people per year (this is the approximate total passenger traffic of Sheremetyevo and Domodedovo combined for 2016), its own high-speed railway line, monorail, highway, hotel, six terminals, six runways, including strips for receiving supersonic airliners, and so on. The first stage of the airport was put into operation in 1975, but the plans of its creators were not destined to come true. Erroneous planning of traffic flows, the decline in the attractiveness of Montreal as an economic center, changes in the policies of the Quebec government and other factors led to the fact that during its entire existence, not even 3 million passengers passed through Mirabel per year.
In 2004, due to unprofitability, the airport stopped serving regular commercial flights, turning into a cargo air harbor. Races began to be held on the vast runways, and films were filmed in the terminal building. And in 2014, they decided to demolish the terminal building because it was too expensive to operate and no one really needed it. The construction of Mirabell Airport was recognized as a mistake, and honorary title The “white elephant” was assigned to it in the first decade of its existence. This happens quite often with airports. Thus, the new main Berlin air harbor - Willy Brandt Berlin-Brandenburg Airport - was planned to open back in 2011, but it still does not accept either planes or passengers due to errors in the project.
Basilica of Notre-Dame de la Paix
Yamoussoukro, Ivory Coast
In 1983, the permanent president of Côte d’Ivoire, Felix Houphouet-Boigny, who by that time was managing this small African country for almost a quarter of a century, decided to move the capital from the large developed coastal city of Abidjan inland, namely to the village of Yamoussoukro - where the politician was born and raised. Two years later, Houphouët-Boigny laid the foundation stone for the largest church in the world, Notre-Dame de la Paix, or Our Lady of Peace. Construction took four years and cost the country's budget, according to various estimates, from 175 to 600 million dollars. And this is not surprising: hundreds of tons of marble were brought from Italy, stained glass windows from France, the building ended up with an area of 30 thousand square meters. m and a height of 158 meters (higher than St. Peter's Cathedral in Rome, although Notre-Dame de la Paix can accommodate about 18 thousand people, which is three times less than the same St. Peter's Cathedral). The square paved with granite and marble in front of the basilica can accommodate another 200 thousand people, that is, approximately the entire population of Yamoussoukro, of which at most 19% are Catholics.
Speaking of population, about 42% of the population of Côte d'Ivoire lives below the poverty line, that is, on less than $1.25 a day. Services in the basilica gather today at best case scenario hundreds of people.
Ryugyong Hotel
Pyongyang, North Korea
In 1987, the North Korean government, led by President Kim Il Sung, announced the start of construction of the tallest building in the country - the 105-story, 330-meter Ryugyong Hotel with 3,000 (according to other sources - 7,700) rooms and with revolving restaurants on top.
The construction of the hotel was planned to be completed by the World Festival of Youth and Students in 1989, but due to problems with materials, the main structures were completed only by 1992, after which work stopped altogether for almost a decade and a half due to the economic crisis, and the skeleton of the Ryugyong became symbol of Pyongyang. Construction resumed in 2008, and within three next year the concrete structure was lined with glass, the new opening date was set to 2013, and the first photographs of the interiors of the future hotel appeared on the Internet. The opening, however, has not taken place to this day, and experts around the world doubt that North Korea is even capable of completing construction and that the building is suitable for use. It is noteworthy that London's tallest skyscraper, The Shard ( The Shard), which has a similar shape, is also half empty - buyers are in no hurry to purchase apartments worth 30-50 million pounds sterling.
Shopping complex "New Shopping Center of South China"
Dongguan, China
In 2005, in a poor suburb of Dongguan with a population of 6 million, a five-story shopping complex “New Shopping Center” was opened South China"(New South China Mall) - the largest in the world. The construction cost exceeded $1.3 billion. The scale is enormous even by Chinese standards: up to 2,350 retail outlets with total area 660 thousand sq. m (plus another 232 thousand sq. m of other premises), a 25-meter model of the Parisian Arc de Triomphe, canals with gondolas, roller coasters and other entertainment - and no visitors. In the first years after opening, tenants occupied only 1% of the center's space. Ten years later, this figure increased tenfold, but even today the complex is largely empty. The reason is that local population is not making enough money to make the complex attractive to sellers, and the developers' hopes that Dongguan residents will become rich have not been realized.
City of Galician culture
Santiago de Compostela, Spain
At the beginning of 1999, the Galician Parliament announced that the work of the architect Peter Eisenman won in the design competition for the City of Culture of Galicia (Cidade da Cultura de Galicia): buildings on the Monte Gaias hill, as if squeezed out of the ground and resembling both cobblestones and mollusk shells, should were sheltered concert halls, galleries, museums, library and archive. Construction lasted more than ten years, cost at least twice as much as planned (in the project, Aizenman indicated a figure of 400 million euros) and was eventually stopped by a decision of the regional government. Two of the six buildings remained unfinished, and most importantly, the vast complex never attracted the expected number of tourists and local residents, while its maintenance is very expensive for the local budget.
Clem Jones Tunnel
Brisbane, Australia
At the beginning of this century, the government of Brisbane, Australia, decided to build a series of tunnels to ease traffic in the city and reduce travel time from one end to the other. One of these tunnels was the 4.8-kilometre Clem Jones, which runs under the Brisbane River. When construction began in 2005, the tunnel was expected to be the longest in Australia. It cost A$3.2 billion (approximately US$2.5 billion) to build and was not an easy task: the builders had to break through very hard rock - Brisbane tuff, for which they used the largest tunneling machines in the world at that time, costing 50 million Australian dollars each.
The tunnel and access roads were finally opened on February 28, 2010 to a large crowd. But it soon became clear that citizens use the tunnel much less often than the city council had planned: for example, officials expected that 60 thousand cars would pass through the tunnel every day, but in fact about 20 thousand drivers use it every day, and it saves only eight minutes on the road and relieves other city highways by only 5–10%. Travel through the tunnel is paid, but even discounts and radical price reductions (to the detriment of the project's return on investment) do not help increase the attractiveness of the structure among city residents. The operating company's losses in 2010 amounted to 1.6 billion Australian dollars.
Objects of the 2004 Olympics
Athens and surroundings, Greece
The Greek capital has been fighting for the right to host the Summer Olympics since the early 1990s and, having lost the 1996 anniversary Games to the American Atlanta, finally received the right to host the 2004 Olympics. Preparations for the Games - the construction of sports and transport facilities, the Olympic village - cost the country's government 9 billion euros. And although officials recognized the Games as profitable, the costs only aggravated the severe debt crisis that began three years after their completion. At the same time, the costs of maintaining sports facilities in proper condition were estimated at 500 million euros annually, and these facilities themselves turned out to be of no use to anyone. Thus, the center for rowing competitions turned into a fetid swamp and a place comfortable stay hordes of mosquitoes, the shooting stadium is overgrown, and Olimpic village is gradually destroyed. Interestingly, approximately the same thing is happening with the Olympic venues in Rio de Janeiro and Beijing, as well as with sports facilities built for the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa.
Palace of Parliament
Bucharest, Romania
This is the heaviest and largest in area administrative building in the world, it was ordered to be built by Romanian President Nicolae Ceausescu in 1984. To build the Palace of Parliament, builders demolished a fifth of Old Bucharest, tore down the top of Spirius Hill, used 1 million tons of marble, 3.5 thousand tons of crystal, 700 thousand tons of steel and bronze, 900 thousand cubic meters of wood and 200 thousand square meters. meters of carpets. By the time of Ceausescu's execution in 1989, the 12-story building, 86 meters high (not counting underground rooms 92 meters deep), was in to a greater extent completed, although work stopped with the fall of communism in Romania. Some parts of the building are still unfinished. Now the palace premises have a total area of 365 thousand square meters. meters (this is about one and a half Red Squares in Moscow) are located both houses of the Romanian parliament, three museums and a conference center. Together they occupy about 30% of the palace. The cost of the structure is estimated at 3 billion euros, while its lighting and heating costs approximately 6 million euros annually - about the same amount a medium-sized Romanian city spends per year on the same needs.
In recent decades Chinese cities are actively developing and surprising the whole world grandiose construction projects. with their own tall skyscrapers and with long bridges, the PRC wants to show that China is no longer what it was before. This post will introduce you to the grandiose projects of Chinese builders.
The Qingdao Bay Bridge cost US$16 billion and is an impressive 42.5 kilometers long. At the time of its completion in 2011, it was the longest bridge in the world, but later lost this title.
But we will still get to projects with tens of billions. For now, let's start with the "small" ones. For example, the FAST radio telescope, the construction of which was completed just this month. It cost China 100 million US dollars, and its diameter is 500 meters.
The Guangzhou Opera House is one of the largest theaters in China. And it costs 200 million dollars.
Central building no less Central television China is a bizarre figure of six “tribes”. Square? 144.1 thousand sq. meters!
A pumped storage power plant on one of the rivers flowing into Lake Taihu in the east of the country is playing important role in providing the region with electricity. Budget - 900 million US dollars.
And here is the building of the Shanghai World financial center(pictured on the right) with a height of 492 meters is the first project in our top to exchange a billion dollars. The building has 101 floors and is located almost at the very top of the Park Hyatt Shanghai hotel.
The Tianxingzhou Yangtze River Bridge cost US$1.7 billion and was the longest cable-stayed bridge carrying road and rail traffic when it opened seven years ago.
The Nanjing Metro cost the same amount. And every day it transports more than half of the total population of Latvia, that is, 1.5 million people.
Shanghai Bridge and Tunnel over the Yangtze. The length is 22.5 kilometers, and the budget is 1.8 billion dollars. And metro trains will also run along it!
Nuclear power plant in Kinshan. Probably one of the biggest nuclear power plants on the planet - seven reactors are already in operation, two are still under construction and two more are planned. The budget for current construction alone is more than 2 billion US dollars.
Shanghai Tower at 632 meters high, it is the third tallest building in the world. It was built for an immodest 2.4 billion US dollars.
Capital International Airport serving Beijing is the second busiest airport in the world. Its large-scale reconstruction and expansion in the 2000s cost $3.5 billion, but it quickly became clear that this was not enough - it could not cope with the flow of passengers, so three years ago they began building another giant airport near Beijing.
The Xiangjiaba hydroelectric power station on the Jinsha River cost China $6.3 billion, and its installed capacity is 6,448 MW (almost 8 times more than the Plavinska hydroelectric power station).
Beijing South Station was reconstructed in 2008 at a cost of $6.3 billion, is one of the largest in Asia and serves express trains. Chinese trains, reaching speeds of up to 350 km/h.
Sutun is the king of cable-stayed bridges, its length exceeds 8 kilometers and is only steeper than it cable-stayed bridge to Russky Island in Russia. Almost 8 billion dollars.
The Wenchang satellite launch center cost China $12 billion. By the way, this is the fourth cosmodrome in the country. And the newest one was commissioned in 2014.
Yangshan Port is a deep-sea container port, part of the Port of Shanghai. Its capacity is 12.3 million TEU, and its total length is about 20 kilometers. Budget? An immodest 12 billion dollars.
The high-speed route cost “only” 2 billion more Railway Harbin - Dalian, capable of serving high speed trains at "alpine" heights.
But the Beijing-Shanghai high-speed railway, 1318 kilometers long, generally allows trains to accelerate to cruising speed at 380 km/h. 35 billion dollars - that's how much it cost.
43 billion dollars is the budget of the International Asian Network, a project to improve the highway network in Asian countries. Wouldn’t it be cool to “stand up” on a highway somewhere outside of Istanbul and tear along good roads all the way to Tokyo?!
Ground Zero reconstruction
LOCATION
New York, USA
opening date
2017
Price
$25 billion
International Space Station
LOCATION
Earth's orbit
opening date
2024
Price
$150 billion
The most expensive international science project: Since its launch in 1998, $150 billion has already been spent on the assembly and maintenance of the ISS. Consisting of 14 modules, the station is a hundred meters long and can accommodate 6 astronauts. This is not the last configuration of the ISS: in the coming years, two more research modules should be attached to it. It recently became known that Russia will not participate in the project until 2024, as was previously assumed: instead, Roscosmos will focus on new projects.
Masdar city
LOCATION
Abu Dhabi, UAE
opening date
2020
Price
$20 billion
Science parks connecting business and cutting-edge research are being built around the world - high tech can become the basis of economics for economies developing countries. However, even among the laggards there are already clear winners: the rich countries of the Persian Gulf, investing in the creation future infrastructure excess income from the sale of hydrocarbons. Such, for example, is the Masdar project in Abu Dhabi - not a technology park, but the whole city priced at $20 billion, designed by the British bureau Norman Foster. Jobs in a post-industrial city of 50,000 people will be built around a new Institute of Science and Technology, working closely with MIT. The first scientific research buildings in Masdar appeared back in 2010, and by the time of its completion in 2020, the city will become the embodiment of all modern technologies. The city will implement an innovative system of personal automatic transport, and the entire required energy will come from renewable sources.
Dubailand Amusement Park
LOCATION
Dubai, UAE
opening date
2015
Price
$65 billion
The Winter Olympics in Sochi cost $51 billion - these are the most expensive sport games in history, but hardly the largest entertainment megaproject. In just a year, the Dubailand complex is due to open in the UAE: on an area of 300 square kilometers will house 45 theme parks, sports complexes, shopping and leisure centers and hotels. Dubailand will be twice as big" World Center Walt Disney Resort" in Florida and will become the most big place entertainment on the planet.
Songdo City
LOCATION
South Korea
opening date
2015
Price
$40 billion
Founded just ten years ago, South Korean Songdo is both an analogue of the Al-Maktoum aeropolis and the scientific city of Masdar. This is a compact business city located near Incheon International Airport and connected to it by a spectacular suspension bridge. In a couple of years, about 65 thousand people will live here - mostly entrepreneurs and scientists working at one of the four local universities. Songdo was created from scratch as a “green” and “smart” city. It will become a platform for experiments in the field of Internet of Things.
The largest structure in the world by mass, but the second in height May 6th, 2013
We are with you very much. However, this was the first time I heard about this building. And it’s practically a record holder! See how times change and new objects appear right before your eyes!
Abraj Al Bayt Towers also known as "Makkah Clock Royal Tower" is a huge residential complex which is located in Mecca, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The building is unique in that it holds several world records in marine construction. These include: the tallest hotel in the world, the tallest clock tower in the world and the largest clock, the largest building in the world by area, the second tallest building in the world after Burj Dubai. Construction complex built a few meters from the largest Islamic mosque - Masjid al Haram.
It is the largest (but not the tallest) structure in the world by mass, and it is also the tallest structure in Saudi Arabia and second in the world after Burj Khalifa
That's how it all began!
Once completed, it will be the tallest free-standing tower, the tallest building in Saudi Arabia, and the world's largest and tallest hotel, with a planned height of 601 meters. The area of the structure will be 1,500,000 m2. Same as Terminal 3 at Dubai International Airport, United United Arab Emirates which is also under construction. The Abraj Al Bayt Towers will surpass the Emirat Park Towers in Dubai, which until now was considered the tallest hotel in the world. A complex of 6 towers, the height of the central one (somewhat reminiscent of Big Ben in London) is 525 meters.
The building is located across the road south of the entrance to the Masjid al Haram mosque, which houses the Kaaba. The most high tower The complex will serve as a hotel to help provide accommodation for the more than five million pilgrims who visit Mecca each year to participate in the Hajj.
Abraj al-Bayt will have a four-story shopping center and a garage that can accommodate more than a thousand cars. The residential towers will house residents and two helipads and a conference center to accommodate business guests. IN total, up to 100,000 people can be accommodated inside the tower. The project will use clock faces for each side of the hotel tower. The highest residential floor will be located at 450 meters, just below the clock. Dimensions of the dials are 43 × 43 m (141 × 141 m). The roof of the clock is located at an altitude of 530 meters above the ground. A 71 meter spire will be added to top part hours, giving it a total height of 601 meters, which will make it the second tallest building in the world when fully completed, surpassing Taipei 101 in Taiwan.
The tower will house an Islamic museum and a lunar observation center.
The complex is being built by the Bin Laden Group, the largest construction company in Saudi Arabia. The clock tower is designed by the German company Premiere Composite Technologies, Clock, from the Swiss engineering company Straintec. The total cost of the project is $800 million. The Bin Laden Group was founded by Mohammed bin Laden.
Tower name:
1. Zamzam is a well in Mecca, located on the territory of the Al-Haram mosque. Archangel Gabriel pointed out its location to Hagar, Ishmael's mother.
2. Hagar - a slave, Sarah's servant during the latter's childlessness, who became Abraham's concubine and bore him a son, Ishmael.
3.Qibla - direction towards the Kaaba. In Muslim religious practice, believers must face this direction during prayer.
4.Safa - Safa and Marwa are two hills in courtyard al-Haram mosques mentioned in the Koran. During the Hajj, pilgrims climb Safa Hill, face the Kaaba and turn to Allah in prayer.
5.Makam - Analogue of the Christian Ladder, spiritual state on the path of self-improvement
More than five million pilgrims visit Mecca every year. The Royal Tower houses a hotel that can accommodate about 100 thousand people. In addition, the towers contain residential apartments, a shopping center, a garage for 800 cars and even 2 helipads.
Construction of Abraj al-Bayt was completed in 2012.
In 5-star Abraj al-Bait 858 rooms, served by 76 elevators, also designed to provide easy access to the Holy Mosque Al Haram for prayers.
Thanks to its proximity to Holy Kaaba, the holiest site in Islam, Abraj al-Bait will become a “beacon for pilgrims”, guests will also be able to visit the museum of Islamic icons and art objects intended for the development of cultural heritage region.
To the complex Abraj al-Bait includes three luxury hotels with luxury apartments, a four-story shopping center, two helipads and a conference center.
The hotel has nine restaurants, where you can taste both Indian and Lebanese cuisine, and taste grilled steak.
Vashne is home to a lunar observatory and a museum of Islam. She is in a huge complex Abraj al-Bait, which is part of King Abdulaziz's development project aimed at modernizing the surrounding area Mecca and Medina.
The Meccan clock is located on the Royal Clock Tower of the Abraj Al-Bait high-rise building complex, which is located almost opposite the main shrines of Islam, the Al-Haram Mosque and the Kaaba house. All of Abraj al-Bayt's buildings are five-star hotels, where wealthy Muslim pilgrims stay on the Hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca.
It is worth talking about the Abraj al-Bayt high-rise building complex in a little more detail. This complex was built by Saudi Arabia's largest construction firm, Saudi Binladin Group, in 2012. The complex, which cost approximately $15 billion to build, is itself the largest hotel in the world, capable of accommodating 100,000 guests. In addition, the complex is the most massive structure in the world and the tallest structure in Saudi Arabia. Height of his Sentinel Royal Tower is 601 meters and in height this building is second only to one building in the world - the Burj Khalifa tower in Dubai.
The total height of the Royal Clock Tower also includes the height of the 70-meter spire, which is topped with an Islamic crescent. By the way, this spire is used to track the Moon during the Islamic holiday of Ramadan. But, in addition to all the above, this tower contains another technological miracle - the world's largest clock, developed by the Swiss company Straintec.
Each of the four dials of this clock, located at an altitude of about 400 meters, has a diameter of 43 meters and consists of 98 million glass mosaic pieces. Dials, hour hands, 17 meters long, and minute hands, 22 meters long, illuminated by two million green and white. In addition, another 21 thousand LEDs form something like information boards, on which calls for each of the five daily prayers are displayed. Thanks to high altitude Due to the location of these watches, the light from their dials and additional displays is visible in good weather at a distance of about 30 kilometers.
Architecture is a delicate matter. In order to build a banal 12-story block house, you need to go through many authorities, get a bunch of certificates and permits. And how many problems will then arise with the implementation of the desired project! Searching for specialists, builders, possible locations, coordinating all this with local leadership... Of course, the face of any city is precisely architectural structures of varying scale and scope. However, not all ideas and developments are carried out in real life. Next you can see various architectural projects, which (fortunately or unfortunately) were not implemented.
Palace of the Soviets. B. Iofan, V. Gelfreich, J. Belopolsky, V. Pelevin. Sculptor S. Merkulov. One of the approved project options. 1946
History does not know such concepts: “what would happen if...”, however, the project of the Palace of Soviets was conceived as the construction of the big building on the ground. Its height was supposed to reach 415 meters - higher than the most tall buildings of his time: Eiffel Tower and the Empire State Building skyscraper. The building-pedestal was to be crowned with a sculpture of Lenin 100 meters high. The construction of the Palace of Soviets has become an independent economic and scientific research industry. In this system, special laboratories for optics and acoustics functioned, for the development of special materials: “D.S. steel”, “D.S. brick”, mechanical and expanded clay concrete plants operated, and a separate railway line was connected to the construction site. By special resolutions of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR and the Council of Labor and Defense, the construction of the Palace of Soviets was announced shock construction 1934, by the end of 1939 the foundations of the high-rise part were ready. In 1941, due to the war, construction was suspended and never resumed. Work on the Palace of Soviets project continued until the end of the 40s.
It’s scary to even imagine how much space such a development would take up! We could safely say goodbye to our current understanding of the architecture of Red Square. However, a similar idea arose. And it arose in 1922, when the First Congress of Soviets met. Despite the fact that the building was never completed, work on its project served as a powerful impetus for the development of domestic architecture, and was born a new style, called "Stalinist classicism". It was the Palace of the Soviets that was predicted to be the best building of all time; it was supposed to decorate Moscow, uniting all the high-rise buildings into a single complex.
However, morals are changing. What was once considered monstrous is now considered quite ubiquitous, and vice versa. After all, the French also resisted the erection of a real “monster” - the Eiffel Tower in their small romantic capital. Now the tower is considered a real national treasure. Probably got used to it.
Heroes' arc. Monument to the heroic defenders of Moscow. L. Pavlov. 1942
Since October 1942, at the height of the Great Patriotic War The newspaper “Literature and Art” reported: “The competition for monuments to the heroes of the Great Patriotic War is ending. About 90 works were submitted from Moscow sculptors and architects. Information was received about the sending of projects from Leningrad, Kuibyshev, Sverdlovsk, Tashkent and other cities of the USSR. Over 140 projects are expected to arrive.” In order to familiarize the public with the materials of the competition, three exhibitions were organized in Moscow in the winter and spring of 1943, at which the submitted projects were exhibited. The terms of the competition, among other topics, included the creation of a monument to the “Heroic Defenders of Moscow.” The choice of location for the monument was at the discretion of the competitors. The author of the “Arch of Heroes,” architect L. Pavlov, proposed placing his monument on Red Square. The monument was not built.
Who knows, perhaps we have lost a great monument.
Aeroflot House. D. Chechulin. 1934
In 1934, the whole world followed the dramatic fate of the crew of the icebreaker Chelyuskin, who was drifting on an ice floe after the death of the ship in the Chukchi Sea. In the summer of the same year, Moscow met the brave Chelyuskinites and the pilots who saved them, who were the first to be awarded the title of Hero Soviet Union. New traditions of socialist life required perpetuation glorious feat Soviet people in monumental forms. The Aeroflot building, which was planned to be erected on the square near Belorussky railway station, was conceived by the architect D. Chechulin as a monument to the heroic Soviet aviation. Hence the sharp silhouette solution, the “aerodynamic” shape of the high-rise building and the sculptural figures of heroic pilots: A. Lyapidevsky, S. Levanevsky, V. Molokov, N. Kamanin, I. Slepnev, I. Vodopyanov, I. Doronin, crowning seven openwork arches , turned perpendicular to the main facade and forming a kind of portal. The sculptor I. Shadr took part in the work on the project, sculpting the figures of the pilots. The project was not implemented in its original form and purpose. Almost half a century later, the general ideas of the project were embodied in the House complex Supreme Council RSFSR on Krasnopresnenskaya embankment (now the Government House).
Having learned about such a project, you can understand how much Moscow residents do not know about their city.
The Japanese construction corporation Shimizu dreams of building the Mega-City Pyramid, a pyramidal city for 750 thousand people, someday in Tokyo Bay.
According to various sources, the height of the pyramid should be approximately from 700 to 2004 meters (by the way, another name of the project is TRY 2004). Although, according to the Discovery Channel, the real number is still the first. But it's not that important. One way or another, Mega-City Pyramid will be several times higher Great Pyramid in Giza.
On spacious square kilometers pyramids can accommodate residential areas, offices, cultural centers and all other infrastructure typical of a regular city. Only in terms of the density of the “packing of people” will this pyramid surpass an ordinary city - due to significant upward expansion.
Why the Japanese are trying to outdo Egyptian builders is not clear. However, the project still remains unfulfilled.
The construction was planned in the city of Scottsdale (USA). Estimated height of the house-city: 2100 meters.
"The Hexagonal City of Paolo Soleri" is one of the first city-building projects, dating back to the 60s of the 20th century.
Bionic Tower II - this is the name of an equally grandiose project, developed this time by the Chinese.
At the base of the tower there is a “green circle” - a garden or park with a diameter of about 90 meters. The ECE Tower sticks out of it - a 24-story building approximately 100 meters high with 25 thousand square meters usable area for housing (168 apartments with three bedrooms each) and offices.
The skyscraper is assembled from eight sections 12 meters high. Each section has three floors. From top to bottom, in a spiral, a vertical garden descends, through which a staircase for emergency evacuation runs (high-speed elevators are also provided, don’t be alarmed).
Most large area has an 11th floor, and the ground floor under its dome should house shops, gyms, cinemas and so on. Somewhere below there is also parking for 208 cars.
The architect believes that one complex should be separated from the other at a distance of about 180 meters, which did not stop him from connecting the “circles” of eight towers on the principle of the Olympic rings in one of the sketches.
Judging by the plan developed by the building's designers, the colossal scale of construction exceeds all imaginable and unimaginable expectations. Despite the death of the American "Twins", architects are striving for greater grandeur and bombast in their designs. At this rate, you can come to a fantastic future from the movie “The Fifth Element”, where the number of floors of high-rise buildings can no longer be calculated.
Project: X-ceed 4000.
X-Seed 4000 - tallest building ever conceived.
Its height should be 4,000 meters above sea level. Thanks to the 600-meter foundation, the structure will be placed directly above the sea. X-Seed 4000 should accommodate between 700,000 and 1,000,000 inhabitants.
The project is being developed for the capital of Japan construction company Tasai Corporation as a building of the future, where ultra-modern living and interaction with nature will be combined. Unlike conventional skyscrapers, X-Seed 4000 will protect its inhabitants from pressure changes and shifts weather conditions along the entire height of the building. Its design involves the use of solar energy to power the entire microclimate control system in the building.
The elevators are designed for 200 passengers and deliver to the top floor in 30 minutes. In addition to thousands of apartments and offices, X-Seed 4000 will also have entertainment centers, parks, and forests.
It is assumed that the cost of building X-Seed 4000 will be 300-900 billion.
Construction of the project is expected to take 8 years. I wonder if the calculations are correct?
The Spiral project, developed in 1998, was never seen by residents of the city of Tokyo. The two-hundred-story architectural development, 1,000 meters high, remained in the developers’ drawings.
Project "Sky City 1000"
The structure would consist of 14 floors-microdistricts, each of which would house multi-storey residential, office and retail buildings, sports and entertainment complexes, recreational areas with ponds and green spaces, as well as local transport hubs and many other infrastructure of an ordinary modern city.
For reference:
More than 35 thousand people could live in the skyscraper-city “Sky City 1000”, more than 100 thousand people could work;
The diameter of the base of the tower is 400 meters.
Is fantasy becoming reality?
Great Pyramid Project
The pyramid is designed as a huge tomb with several million seats. German project non-profit organization Freunde der Großen Pyramide suggests that the process of burial will also mean the process of building the pyramid, until the addition of more and more tomb blocks after a few decades completes the monumental image of the tetrahedral pyramid.
A literal parody of the legendary Egyptian monuments in the German version looks very ridiculous and unacceptable for modern society. The project was not implemented.
Thus, looking at all these developments, we can conclude that from year to year humanity, creating one project after another, striking the mind with its inclinations towards gigantism, strives to be closer to the sky, away from the earth, trying to position huge territories inside buildings of amazing size. The reasons for such desires of humanity can be different: either it is a cult of personality, or the desire for perfection, or perhaps the achievement of new heights and the desire to “overtake” the past achievements of their colleagues. In a word: the best is the enemy of the good, and before taking on grandiose projects, you need to think first of all about the real possibilities and consequences of erecting such monuments.