It?ll be 5,250 feet tall and take up 5.3 million square metres of room, therefore construction may well be a little difficult. First of all, and presumably because there aren?t any mile-high cranes available, helicopters will have to be used to transport materials to the top. Additionally, builders will have to be flown to work also, after all, it would seem a little unfair to make them walk all the way up those steps in the morning.
Once the tower is built, bin Talal is also planning to install a super-advanced electro-magnetic lift system, as opposed to the traditional cable driven type. This will mean that a single shaft within the building will be able to accommodate several elevators, and the speed of the ascent to the top will be an awesome 1,010 meters a minute and take a record-breaking two minutes.There is also the small matter of visitor sickness. As exemplified by the 1,670 feet tall Taipei Tower, shortly after construction, visitors to its 101st storey were experiencing sickness because of the way it swayed in the wind. To stop this, the world?s largest ever damper sphere (essentially, a 660 metric ton ball) was attached to the 92nd floor to act as a counter to the winds. Of course, bin Talal?s building is going to be just a little taller than the Taipei Tower and will have to withstand even stronger winds.
The builders will also have to take into account the erratic weather changes that occur in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, as the top of the tower will have to withstand scorching heat by day and freezing temperatures by night.
The current budget for the project stands at $10 billion and will be built in conjunction with a bigger development of schools, offices and homes in the area. Despite its impressive and advanced nature, it has been met with mixed responses in regards to its high costs, and I have to admit that window-cleaning costs probably won?t be pretty either, let alone house insurance prices in the shadow of a swaying mile high one-of-a-kind!
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