Okay so today was the opening ceremony for the new Tallest Building In The World. The Burj Khalifa is the new big boy on the block by a big margin. Taipei 101 held the title for almost 5 years at nearly 1700 feet in height. The Burj Khalifa bursts onto the scene at over 2700 feet. Wow! So think about it this way. Saying that the Burj is 1000 feet taller than Taipei 101 sounds impressive but saying that it's one and a half times as tall is truly astounding.
I'm not a structural engineer but I have an appreciation for the skill and knowledge that those folks have. The engineers at Skidmore, Owings, and Merrill have set a new bar though. Not only is it the tallest building but the Burj is also very stylistically beautiful in my opinion.
Today's opening was talked about in many places but two of the more interesting posts or at least the ones that bring up the most interesting discussions in my mind are these:
WSJ.com - Opinion: Of Burj and Babel
World's tallest building: Is the Burj Khalifa a herald of economic woe?
Makes for some interesting thoughts. Not necessarily that this might be the bottom for Dubai or anything like that, necessarily. What is it about bad economic times that leads to big buildings? Are really big buildings just an expression of "See how cool I am"?
Those questions leads me to others. Why do we as humans feel the need to make things bigger and bigger? Why was a building like the Burj needed in Dubai at all? Is it really necessary in a place like Dubai? Are really tall building's an efficient use of space and resources?
That last question leads me to thinking about how tall buildings intersect what I'm truly interested in. Are tall buildings good for cities? Does the benefit of having that much square footage focused into a relatively small footprint offset the expenditure the vast amount of resources necessary to put it there? So many questions. Lot to think about.
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