TAIPEI, TAIWAN.- The Business Times Online Edition reported that Taipei’s, as well as the whole world’s” tallest building now juts above cloud cover. “The Pacific Ocean’s ’Ring of Fire’ doesn’t sound like the best place to put up a skyscraper, and certainly not the world’s tallest. In addition to the earthquakes that give this zone its name, Taiwan is visited several times a year by typhoons and winds of 100 mph,” they said.
Previously the Petronas in Malaysia was the world’s tallest building. The building takes on its architectural shape much in the same design as mother nature designed bamboo. The building rises in eight slanted sections of eight floors each, and is even green too. The Building is 507.9 meters tall.
More than one superlative applies to Taipei 101. According to Emporis.com, a comprehensive database on tall buildings, it is the world’s only super-tall building in a highly active seismic zone. Besides having the tallest structural height in the world, the standard measure used to determine ’worlds tallest’, it also has the tallest roof and the world’s highest occupied floor. (The building with the tallest tip is the CN Tower in Toronto which, with its antenna, stands at 551.7 meters.)
“Taipei 101 uses the world’s fastest elevators, whisking visitors to the 89th floor observation deck in just 39 seconds. According to Emporis.com, each elevator cost more than US$2 million. Only two of the building’s 63 elevators will offer non-stop service to the top. Yet Taipei 101 will also be one of the few buildings in the world with double-deck elevators, also reported the Business Times.
The US$1.7 billion project broke ground in 1998 and was topped out last October. The five-story shopping mall adjacent to it opened last autumn, but Taipei 101 itself will not be completed until late this year.
The Tapai has undergone tests to verify its sturdiness, and a simulation was done to determine its safety if hit directly by a jumbo jet. Even before the Sept 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, architects had planned two fireproof refuge rooms every eight floors with emergency supplies and communications. The building also exceeds Taiwan’s stringent seismic standards by five times to withstand the type of earthquake that comes only once every 2,500 years. But tremblers are not the biggest worry.
Although the building is so strong it is highly flexible as it needs to have some leeway for wind. As in most skyscrapers, a device called a tuned-mass damper - usually a heavy concrete block - is mounted in the building to help stabilise it against winds and quakes. Taipei 101 features the world’s largest tuned-mass damper, and in a bold design decision, architects decided to leave it exposed, allowing visitors to view the 730-tonne ball, painted gold. Although it reduces swaying, the top of the building will still swing up to 1.5 m in each direction.
To date the ten tallest buildings in the word are:
1. Taipei 101, Taipei 509 m 1,671 ft 101 floors 2004
2. Petronas Tower 1, Kuala Lumpur 452 m 1,483 ft 88 floors 1998
3. Petronas Tower 2, Kuala Lumpur 452 m 1,483 ft 88 floors 1998
4. Sears Tower, Chicago 442 m 1,450 ft 108 floors 1974
5. Jin Mao Tower, Shanghai 421 m 1,380 ft 88 floors 1998
6. Two International Finance, Hong Kong 415 m 1,362 ft 88 floors 2003
7. CITIC Plaza, Guangzhou 391 m 1,283 ft 80 floors 1997
8. Shun Hing Square, Shenzhen 384 m 1,260 ft 69 floors 1996
9. Empire State Building, New York City 381 m 1,250 ft 102 floors 1931
10. Central Plaza, Hong Kong 374 m 1,227 ft 78 floors 1992
