The World's Tallest Buildings
The building that will become the world’s second tallest has been announced by Emaar Properties. It will be built by the same developer who built the world’s current tallest building, the Burj Khalifa. The new $1 billion (£710 million) building will be located at the site of the building which went on fire on New Year’s Eve a few months ago.
The new building will exceed the height of the Burj Khalifa, but has not been given a name yet or announced how high, however it has been commented that it will stand a “notch higher”. It will be slender in design, with a needle-like tip, as shown below. It is designed by Spanish-Swiss architect Santiago Calatrava Valls.
The building will have a luxury hotel, 18 – 20 floors of shops, and glass balconies that will rotate externally. Construction is set to begin at the end of June 2016 and complete in 2020.
There was concern about UAE’s tall buildings being fire hazards, since they have all been built with the same material that caused the last fire at this site. This particular material is used for cladding the buildings, in the form of exposed wiring placed on the external façade. Officials have ordered for regulations to be tightened.
This new tower and the Burj Khalifa will look be dwarfed when the Jeddah Tower (also known as Kingdom Tower) is complete, also scheduled for 2020. It will stand at a massive 1001m. There have also been plans for a mile high building to be built in Tokyo in in 2045!