Sky-high? Sigh

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This article was published 13/03/2021 (1729 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Winnipeggers have something new to look up to — and we mean way up!

That’s because the city has a new titleholder for tallest building. The soaring skyscraper at 300 Main St., one block from the famed intersection of Portage and Main, captured the crown March 5 when the concrete was poured for the 41st floor.

That puts our newest skyscraper at just over 128 metres, edging out the office tower at 201 Portage Ave., the former TD Centre, which had been the tallest building in Winnipeg since it opened in 1990.

When completed later this year, 300 Main will be a 42-storey colossus reaching 142 metres above the pavement, anchoring the south end of Winnipeg Square. The north end, at 360 Main, features a 30-storey high-rise structure built in 1979.

According to reports, the upper floors will be residential — 400 apartments — with the lower portion set aside for retail and office space. That accounts for 40 floors. The final two are reserved for mechanical needs.

Arguably the city’s most famous skyscraper — the Richardson Building, a 34-storey landmark at Portage and Main, built in 1969 — has been bumped into the third spot.

The new No. 1 on Winnipeg’s skyline is an impressive feat of architecture, but 300 Main still has a little room for growth, as we see from today’s towering list of the Five Tallest Buildings in the World:

5) The (really) tall building: Lotte World Tower in Seoul, South Korea

The (really) tall tale: 555 metres (1,821 feet) tall, with 123 floors

The towering achievement: Seoul’s stunning Lotte World Tower clocks in as the No. 5 tallest building in the world and No. 3 in Asia. It just edges out New York City’s 541.3-metre One World Trade Centre, the lone Western Hemisphere entry on the current top 10 list.

According to thetowerinfo.com, it’s named after a nearby recreation complex known as Lotte World, developed and owned by Lotte Group, one of the largest business conglomerates in South Korea. Construction began in March 2011 and the tower was officially opened on April 2, 2017 with a mind-blowing fireworks display.

Like most skyscrapers, it’s a mixed-use building, including retail stores, offices, a luxury hotel, observation decks and a so-called “officetel,” a hybrid of offices and hotels commonly found in Korea, offering accommodations for people who work in the building and featuring services typically only found in hotels.

The tower’s podium contains a 10-storey shopping mall. Designed to appear sleek and tapered against Seoul’s mountainous topography, the exterior of the tower is comprised of light-toned silver glass, and accented by a filigree of white painted metal. It is able to resist an earthquake of 9.0 on the Richter scale and winds up to 80 metres per second. It’s expected to draw up to 50 million tourists every year, with access to the observation decks provided by the world’s fastest elevators, which ascend at 20 metres per second, whisking visitors to the observation deck on the top floor in less than one minute.

 

4) The (really) tall building: Ping An Finance Centre in Shenzhen, China

The (really) tall tale: 599.1 metres (1,965 feet) tall, with 115 floors

The towering achievement: The Ping An Finance Centre is the towering economic powerhouse of this southern Chinese city near Hong Kong. In the world of skyscrapers, it’s considered “supertall” and is only one metre shy of being rated “megatall.”

It checks in as the No. 4 tallest building in the world. It also broke the record for having the highest observation deck in a building at 562.2 metres (1,844 feet). According to thetowerinfo.com, Ping An has a remarkably slender shape, with a width-to-height aspect ratio of 1:10. As far as looks go, Professor Valery Augustin of the USC School of Architecture says it’s “one of the better of the bunch” on the list of tallest buildings.

“The exterior provides notable structural expression as it rises from base to top,” Augustin told CNN of the tower’s facade of stainless steel and glass. The building is named after its owners, Ping An Insurance Company of China, one of the world’s biggest investment companies. In Chinese, the words Ping An literally mean “Safe and Well.” Most of the office floors are occupied by Ping An Insurance. A hotel takes up 20 floors right below the floors of Ping An headquarters and observatory.

Construction began in November 2009 but was temporarily suspended on March 15, 2013, because of the suspected use of concrete made with unprocessed sea sand, which could corrode the steel structure. Construction resumed after tests showed the material was fine. The pyramid structure on the top was structurally complete in August 2015, making the US$1.5-billion tower fully topped out at 599 metres. In the beginning of 2015, a 60-metre spire on the top of the tower was removed from the design, due to concerns over nearby flight paths.

It has proven irresistible to daredevils, with two successful scalings in 2015 that were documented with video footage and photos.

 

3) The (really) tall building: Makkah Royal Clock Tower in Mecca, Saudi Arabia

The (really) tall tale: 601 metres (1,972 feet) tall, with 120 floors

The towering achievement: Just two metres taller than Shenzen’s Ping An Finance Centre, the Makkah Royal Clock Tower is the No. 3 tallest building in the world, but arguably the most unique skyscraper ever imagined. Built in the busy centre of Mecca next to the Grand Mosque, the tower offers a place for devout Muslims that make the Hajj journey.

“True to its name, four colossal clock faces are mounted near the top of the tower. These clocks hold the record for both the largest and highest in the world,” according to the online database skyscrapercenter.com. It’s the focal point of the Abraj Al Bait Complex, which consists of seven skyscraper hotels that strive to modernize the city in catering to legions of pilgrims. At the centre, is the Royal Clock Tower.

It is considered the world’s second-most expensive building, with the total cost of construction totalling US$15 billion, second only to the Great Mosque of Mecca. The main hotel tower’s highest residential floor stands at 370 metres, just below the media displays under the clock faces. The clock tower is reportedly visible as far as 17 kilometres away. The owner of the Abraj Al Bait complex is the Ministry of Islamic Affairs, which is operated by the Saudi Arabian government. Construction began in 2002 with the controversial removal of a hill and fortress on the site, and was completed in 2019.

“The base of the whole complex covers an area of 34,794 square metres, the floor area of the building reaches up to 1.57 million square metres (and) could accommodate about 100 thousand people,” notes thetowerinfo.com. Along with a shopping mall, Islamic museum, residences and a considerable amount of religious space, there are lots of hotel suites operated by Fairmont Hotels and Resorts.

 

2) The (really) tall building: China’s Shanghai Tower

The (really) tall tale: 632 metres (2,073 feet) tall, with 128 floors

The towering achievement: There is no shortage of really tall buildings in China; in fact, the Asian superpower dominates the list of tallest buildings in the world. But none of them can match the uniqueness of the tallest structure in the prosperous city of Shanghai.

Built for about $2.4 billion, it slides in at No. 2 in the world. The tower takes the form of nine cylindrical buildings stacked atop each other that total 128 floors, all enclosed by the inner layer of the glass facade. “The building is visually arresting with its twisting, spiral shape headed into the sky. And that look isn’t just for show — it helps the building better withstand winds than a traditional rectangular structure,” CNN reported in 2019.

“Architecturally, this one is the best of the bunch,” Professor Valery Augustin of the USC School of Architecture told CNN. “Elegant and inventive.” It’s a mixed-use building that lays claim to being the greenest skyscraper on the planet. “Vertically, the building is divided into nine individual zones that each have their own independent cores with atriums that function as public space that facilitates interaction and active life and allows for panoramic views of the city. Cafes, restaurants, shops and gardens are spread out in these atriums to create a truly urban experience,” gushes the website wonderfulengineering.com.

“The twisting structure… was built with 24 per cent less wind load than usual, a number that is extremely significant both due to its resultant cost saving and also due to the typhoon-level winds that Shanghai experiences annually.” More than 200 wind turbines spin at the top of the tower — the world’s tallest turbines, naturally — which generate about 10 per cent per cent of the building’s electricity. It also collects rainwater, reuses waste water and has 24 “sky gardens” between its two skins.

Completed in 2015, it has had its share of maintenance issues, including water leaks, that have made attracting tenants a struggle.

 

1) The (really) tall building: The Burj Khalifa in Dubai, United Arab Emirates

The (really) tall tale: 828 metres (2,716 feet) tall, with 163 floors and 200 storeys

The towering achievement: Dubai is an international playground for the world’s superstars, but the star that shines the brightest is the Burj Khalifa, the world’s tallest building. “Located in thriving downtown Dubai, the needle-shaped super scraper takes centre stage in the famed skyline with millions of visitors and VIPs flocking each year to arguably the most prestigious address in the world,” CNN gushed in 2018.

“The tallest man-made structure is the ultimate symbol of glitz, glamour and the over-the-top excess for which the city is known.” Construction on this architectural marvel began in 2004 and it was opened in 2010 as part of a new large-scale, mixed-use development called Downtown Dubai. Featuring the world’s first hotel to be designed by Italian fashion legend Giorgio Armani, it cost a reported US$1.5 billion. Blending Islamic influences with modern, energy-saving features, Burj Khalifa “redefined what is possible in the design and engineering of supertall buildings,” according to skyscraper.com.

What was initially called the Burj Dubai was renamed Burj Khalifa to honour the president of the UAE and ruler of Abu Dhabi, Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, who assisted with the funds to create the iconic showpiece. Burj is the Arabic word for tower. Here are a few of the world records it holds: Tallest freestanding structure in the world; elevator with longest travel distance in the world; world’s highest swimming pool in a building (on Level 76); world’s highest nightclub; and world’s highest restaurant. At the peak of construction, more than 12,000 international workers were on site per day logging a collective 22 million man-hours during the six years it took to complete.

There were numerous complaints about the treatment of migrant workers. The Burj Khalifa is twice the height of New York’s Empire State Building and three times as tall as the Eiffel Tower in Paris and, according to CNN, if laid end to end, the tower’s pieces would stretch more than a quarter of the way around the world. Augustin called it “a testament to the will and ingenuity of humankind.”

doug.speirs@freepress.mb.ca