World's tallest building opens in Dubai - Dubai opens world's tallest tower

The world's tallest building has been opened in a dramatic fireworks ceremony in the Gulf emirate of Dubai.
The Burj Khalifa was revealed to be 828m (2,716ft) high, far taller than the previous record holder, Taipei 101.
Known as the Burj Dubai during construction, the tower has been renamed after the leader of Dubai's oil-rich neighbour, Abu Dhabi.
Last month, Abu Dhabi gave Dubai a handout of $10bn (£6.13bn) to help it pay off its debts.

Construction of the Burj Dubai began in 2004, at the height of an economic boom.
Clad in 28,000 glass panels, the tower has 160 floors and more than 500,000 sq m of space for offices and flats.

" This great project deserves to carry the name of a great man "
Sheikh Mohammed

The tower also lays claim to the highest occupied floor, the tallest service lift, and the world's highest observation deck - on the 124th floor.
The world's highest mosque and swimming pool will meanwhile be located on the 158th and 76th floors.
Technical challenges
Though not complete on the inside, the tower was officially opened by Dubai's ruler, Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum.

The opening ceremony, held 1,325 days after excavation work started, was attended by some 6,000 guests.
In a surprise move renamed the tower Burj Khalifa, after the president of the United Arab Emirates and emir of Abu Dhabi, Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahayan.
Sheikh Mohammed described the tower as "the tallest building ever created by the hand of man".
"This great project deserves to carry the name of a great man. Today I inaugurate Burj Khalifa," he said.
Sheikh Mohammed also unveiled a plaque inside the tower bearing the new name.
A dramatic fireworks and lights show took place around the tower while a screen displayed its exact height, which had previously been kept secret.
At 828m, Burj Khalifa dwarfs the 508m Taipei 101 and the 629m KVLY-TV mast in the US, the tallest man-made structure. Its spire can been seen 95km (60 miles) away.
"We weren't sure how high we could go," said Bill Baker of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, the building's structural engineer. "It was kind of an exploration... a learning experience."

Mohamed Ali Alabbar, chairman of Emaar Properties, the developer behind Burj Khalifa, told the BBC that the building's design had posed unprecedented technical and logistical challenges, not just because of its height, but also because Dubai was susceptible to high winds and was close to a geological fault line.
"We have been hit with lightning twice, there was a big earthquake last year that came across from Iran, and we have had all types of wind which has hit us when we were building. The results have been good and I salute the designers and professionals who helped build it," he said.

BURJ KHALIFA IN NUMBERS

95 : distance in km at which its spire can be seen

504 : rise in metres of its main service lift

57 : number of lifts

49 : number of office floors

1,044 : number of residential apartments

900 : length in feet of the fountain at the foot of the tower, the world's tallest performing fountain

28,261 : number of glass cladding panels on the exterior of the tower

The design incorporates ideas from traditional Islamic architecture, while the open petals of a desert flower were the inspiration for the tower's base.
Burj Khalifa will be home to 1,044 luxury apartments, 49 floors of offices and eventually a 160-room Armani-branded hotel. Around 12,000 people are expected to live and work in the tower, which is part of a 500-acre development.
However, investors are facing losses even before the tower is completed because property prices in Dubai have slumped amid the global economic crisis.
Some apartments were selling for $2,700 per sq ft, but are now going for less than half that. Analysts say it will be particularly hard to lease office space because few companies can justify paying premiums for luxury.
The developer's government-owned parent company, Dubai World, meanwhile recently had to request a suspension in debt repayments, and Dubai had to turn to Abu Dhabi last year for bail-outs worth $25bn.
The BBC's Malcolm Borthwick in Dubai says developers are holding back on new flagship projects, so Burj Khalifa could mark the end of an era for skyscrapers in the Gulf - at least in the short term.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/middle_east/8439618.stm

Published: 2010/01/04 17:33:25 GMT

© BBC MMX

Debt-hit Dubai opens world's tallest tower

STORY HIGHLIGHTS Dubai on Monday officially opened the world's largest tower, reaching half a mile into the sky Dubai wallowing in debt crisis and a second $10B bail-out loan from neighboring Abu Dhabi Critics see the Burj as a poorly designed throwback to financial boom times RELATED TOPICS Dubai United Arab Emirates (CNN) -- Dubai on Monday officially inaugurated the centerpiece of its decade-long construction boom, with the surprise revelation that the world-beating 168-story skyscraper -- seen by some as a symbol of the city's economic excess -- was even bigger than previously thought. In a glitzy firework-lit ceremony, the city-state's ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum unveiled a plaque commemorating the event and also announced that the $1.5 billion structure has a new name: the Burj Khalifa. Named after Khalifa Bin Zayed, the president of the United Arab Emirates -- and ruler of Abu Dhabi, which recently bailed out debt-ridden Dubai to the tune of $10 billion -- the tower was officially recorded as 828 meters tall, adding 10 meters on to previous height claims. Six years in the making, and now 319 meters higher than previous skyscraping record-holder Taipei 101, Dubai's newest edifice commands dizzying views of the ambitious building program that has transformed the emirate. The structure's architects, Chicago-based Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, have called the Burj Khalifa "a bold global icon that will serve as a model for future urban centers." Declaring that "tall buildings are back," the company predicts that the groundbreaking techniques it used to push the Burj Khalifa to new heights should enable the construction of even taller towers in the future. iReport: Share your photos of the world's tallest buildings "As with any project, SOM's architects and engineers learned a great deal and are ready to apply this to the next world's tallest building as it is certainly possible to go taller," it said. Despite such lofty claims, the Burj Khalifa -- and other construction projects including the Palm Jumeirah and World archipelagos of man-made islands built for the super-rich -- have cast a financial shadow over Dubai. Last year the emirate shocked investors but asking for a freeze on payments owed on its $26 billion in debts. The announcement by Dubai World -- an umbrella group which includes the Burj Khalifa's developers --delivered a cold dose of reality to speculators worldwide who believed the oil-rich region was impervious to the global financial crisis. Facts and figures: Why Dubai is looking up While predicted economic recovery are likely to help Dubai to shake off some of its debt woes, if not fully regain its boom-time ebullience, some say the city's path of prestige over practicality will leave projects like the Burj Khalifa struggling to justify their place in the Gulf state's skyline. "Dubai doesn't really need to have to build tall asides from prestige purposes," Jim Krane, author of "City of Gold: Dubai and the Dream of Capitalism" told CNN in a recent interview. "If you look at it, it's a really bad idea. It uses as much electricity as an entire city. And every time the toilet is flushed they've got to pump water half a mile into the sky," he said. The telescopic shape is also presents problems of a more practical nature Krane says. "The upper 30 or 40 floors are so tiny that they're useless, so they can't use them for anything else apart from storage. They've built a small, not so useful storage warehouse half a mile in the sky," he said. CNN's Barry Neild and Matt Knight contributed to this story.

Find this article at: http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/meast/01/04/dubai.burj/index.html

Economy Is Down, but Dubai Tower Tops All

LANDON THOMAS Jr

LONDON — For all the towers that give shape to Dubai's skyline, the city-state still hails the addition of each new one as a reaffirmation of its reach-for-the-skies spirit.
And so, even in the midst of a devastating real estate crash, Dubai pulled out all the stops Monday to celebrate the opening of the world's tallest building: a rocket-shaped edifice that soars 828 meters, or 2,717 feet, with views that can reach 100-kilometers, or 60-miles.
Following its close brush with bankruptcy late last year, and the tsunami of international criticism that ensued, the opening was also an opportunity for Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid, the ruler of Dubai, to shift attention from the economic troubles that still plague Dubai to the allure of its future.
But they weren't forgotten completely. In a surprise move, the building's name was changed from Burj Dubai to Burj Khalifa, in honor of the president of Abu Dhabi, Sheik Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan.
The last-minute switch carries a symbolic weight in light of the billions of dollars oil-rich Abu Dhabi has poured into Dubai in order to cover its debts. Once the most pridefully autonomous of the United Arab Emirates, Dubai's financial troubles have made it more dependent on Abu Dhabi and likely to be drawn closer into the federation.
"Dubai not only has the world's tallest building, but has also made what looks like the most expensive naming rights deal in history," said Jim Krane, author of City of Gold: Dubai and the Dream of Capitalism. "Renaming the Burj Dubai after Sheikh Khalifa of Abu Dhabi — if not an explicit quid pro quo — is a down-payment on Dubai's gratitude for its neighbor's $10 billion bailout last month."
In any case, the opening festivities had the feel of a national holiday, with fireworks, parachute jumps and shooting streams of water from the world's tallest fountain. Indeed, by the numbers there is much to celebrate.
At a cost estimated at $1.5 billion, the Burj took five years to build, is over 160 floors high and has comfortably surpassed the previous record holder in Taipei.
With its mix of nightclubs, mosques, luxury suites and boardrooms, the Burj is an almost-perfect representation of Dubai's own complexities and contradictions. It will boast the world's first Armani hotel; the world's highest swimming pool, on the 76th floor; the highest observation deck on the 124th floor; and the highest mosque on the 158th floor.
More than 12,000 people will occupy its 6 million square feet, zooming up and down in the 54 elevators that can hit speeds of 65 kilometers, or 40 miles, an hour. It was designed by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill in Chicago.
At a time when a number of Dubai's newly built office towers stand empty, it is 90 percent sold, according to the building's developer Emaar Properties.
To be sure, some have questioned the utility of such a towering project. At least three foreign workers died during the construction and at a time of increasing concerns over global terror, such a building could well pose an inviting target.
But for a city-state that from its very beginning has taken pleasure in proving its doubters wrong, the Burj is evidence that if you build it big and brash enough the people will come, from near and far.
All the same, the Burj's success by no means signals a recovery in Dubai's beaten-down real estate market, where prices have collapsed by as much as 50 percent and may have further fall according to analysts.
With its strong government backing and unquestioned prestige, the Burj was a project that was destined to succeed and its developer, Emaar, had little difficulty in attracting residents — especially as much of the space was sold in the midst of Dubai's real estate frenzy.
Other projects, however, have not been so lucky. One such example is the Omniyat Bayswater, a 24-story office building that stands less than a kilometer away from the Burj and remains more than 50 percent vacant despite having opened more than six months ago.
Targeted to be the flagship structure of an ambitious development project in an area by the sea called Business Bay, the inability of Bayswater to attract tenants is an obvious consequence of the debilitating real estate crisis here that has seen prices halved.
More broadly, however, there is a deeper significance to its desolation that speaks to a larger truth behind the Dubai real estate bubble that, despite the excitement over the Burj, could well forestall a meaningful recovery.
Like many office projects that were born during the peak years Dubai's expansion four to five years ago, the Omniyat Bayswater is estimated to have more than 50 landlords, or more than two per floor — with some landlords owning as little as a 1,000 foot small office suite.
A spokesman for Bayswater said that Omniyat has recognized the problem of multiple landowners and taken steps to address it and that it expects to see floors leased by the second quarter of this year.
At a time when selling real estate was like handing out candy to children, such a strategy became a quick and easy way to finance building projects as speculators from around the world clamored for the smallest slice of Dubai property.
But with the crash, the building's splintered ownership structure has made it virtually impossible to sell a floor or two to foreign companies seeking to expand their presence here.
As a result, few offers have been made for space in buildings using this development model which is called strata title.
"There has been a difficulty in creating a collective of owners," said Nick Maclean of CB Ellis in Dubai. "The majority of the building is empty."
Mr. Maclean says a law is expected soon to rectify this issue.
But with two thirds of the new buildings coming on line this year being under strata title and 70 percent in 2011, a lack of government action could push office vacancy rates to as high as 40 percent.
As for the effect the Burj will have on the overall market, Mr. Maclean said its opening, while heartening to a city that has taken its lumps over the past year, was unlikely to drive an immediate turn around in the market.
"It is a unique building and symbolically important but it is not going to stimulate demand," he said.