it’s mohamed
civil engineer over here

well …. I’m just wondering what kind of foundation will be used to support this tower

burj dubai is now over 800 meters and it’s supported on 192 pile with 50 meter depth underground

so… how deep will be this ower foundation

:)

keep guessing

What does this have to do with mile high megacity towers? Well, imagine what the world would be like if we had never been able to make fractional distillation of crude oil cost-effective. No gasoline and so no long-range automobiles. So while oil might still have become a dominant energy source, it would not be used much outside the context of electricity production because it would be too filthy to burn in small vehicles and would normally only be transported around the world in bulk along few (rail and ship) transit routes. Civilization\’s structure would be confined to nodes along the bulk fossil fuel transport network and its local dispersion limited by the distribution of electric power. Electric cars and electric powered mass transit would be the norm by default. The end result? A civilization that looks like a cross between the Steam Age and the Space Age. A world that looks very much like the world depicted in this Eugene Tsui design.

But what does an imaginary world without gasoline have to do with this? Well, isn\’t that what we aspire to now? You see, there has never really been a technical \’problem\’ with renewable energy. It has always worked in some degree. It just operated under very different logistical limitations compared to fossil fuels -logistics very similar to that of Steam Age energy sources like coal and unrefined oil. We invented the \’problem\’ of renewable energy by demanding that it conform to the logistics of a very different form of energy -gasoline- rather than the more logical tactic of adapting our civilization\’s physical structure to suit its natural logistics -because it\’s sort of difficult for civilization to physically contract given the way property markets work. Governments don\’t reign-in urban property values so there\’s little incentive for contraction. But if you can design a new form of city that challenges the suburban ideas of standard of living and reduce property values by going upward instead of outward it becomes a more viable prospect. THIS is the real message of Tsui\’s design -as well as the arcologies of Paulo Soleri. What they have been trying to tell us for a long time is that we have to physically change how and where we live to be able to live -and live well- in the context of the logistics imposed by sustainability. To sell sustainability on a model of progress and improved standard of living rather than sacrifice, as has been environmentalism\’s tradition for a long time. Levittown is still Levittown even if it\’s made out of straw bale and has solar panels on the roofs. And the best way to show your love for nature is to leave it alone. This is what these designs -in a rather exaggerated way- are trying to say.

Of course, the biggest issue with Tsui\’s designs are that they tend to be based on speculative forms of organic construction we don\’t know how to actually do today. Ferro-cement and fiberglass are still the predominate mediums for free-form organic design right now and that hasn\’t really changed since early in the 20th century. Tsui never seems to address what, exactly, he intends to build his many proposed megastructures out of. (though in his Nexus marine colony design he\’s proposed electrolytic sea accretion -a technology once thought imminent but now known to be something of a hoax)

If I had seen it anywhere other than inhabitat I would have assumed it’s just an example of man’s arrogance: “Watch me build a giant building!”

If it’s green, it’s a little redeemable. But, still unnecessary.

Its from 1991. please try harder to get people informed about latest changes towards a sustainable future, and maybe really things that matter? otherwise you too might be responsible for this key phrase becoming a word which soon nobody really wants to hear anymore. would be a pitty…

High-density development doesn’t have to amputate us from the natural development. I’m a huge fan, personally, of the old Tuscan style of development – small, dense towns full of architectural interest, surrounded by the farmland that supports them and permeated with green space and built from local materials.