Inhabitat

What an elitist venture! Green living is becoming a thing for the rich while the poor lose out as usual. Also, not a one off structure? I hope we won\’t see the return of Le Corbusier\’s Radiant City and the \’machine for living in\’ idea in the name of green architecture.

If its in Dubai, what’s with the green all around it?

Just awful. I don’t think it’s the rich who will live in such dreadful “hyperstructures” but the indentured “guest workers” with no rights. No doubt they’ll be consuming recycled urine, feces, and corpses while being kept out of sight and out of mind.

I do feel what clairseach is saying. Sadly as apart of innovation comes such things. Large amounts of money and the cheapest way to do things possible is how innovation comes about, and must come about to be tested. What other country would try such things? Dubai’s purpose is to impress and draw attention and professionals and money to the region. I do feel sorry it is at the cost of people’s rights, it is a terrible thing, and shouldn’t be condoned, but as long as there is a voice against such treatment, it eventually will not exist once humans learn to be stable and self-sustainable without destroying the environment further.

Could this be the beggining of the construction of Arcologies?… Coooool!!!!

Yeah, it’ll be quite different from our experience to live in one of those things, but what we get in exchange is a green, clean planet… You could actually go outside and instead of mad max, you will get wild kingdom.

I\’m at a bit of a loss here. According to Wikipedia, Dubai (the entire Emirate) only has a total population of 2,262,000.42.3% Indian (wow!), 17% Emirati, 13.3% Pakistani, 7.5% Bangladeshi, 9.1% Arab, 10.8% Others. So essentially building the one Ziggurat would house about half the entire population. If you factor all the other building projects presently being done including the Burj Dubai and for the entire new \’Downtown Dubai\’, (US$20 billion), unless the government is going to just import people wholesale on supertankers it\’s hard for me to see how Dubai isn\’t headed for the greatest real estate glut in human history. (At least short term)

Beautiful

Stop feeling so bad for the workers. Fact is, they are making MUCH more than they would be in their home lands, and they come to Dubai on their own because of that. In turn Dubai gets work done cheaper. Think about it… Why would you hire 100,000 educated people from Europe for 25$ an hour if you can get 100,000 people from poorer countries and pay them 600dhs a month (about what they make here). It’s common sense, as mean as it may be - that’s business. As for this “ho ho now I know where my gas money’s going!” bullshit, just stop talking… What would you rather have them do with oil money?

How come one render looks like its in South America while the other looks like it where it should be…in the desert??? I look at this stuff and wonder what Palo Solari thinks of it. Don’t know him? Look him up : )

Your money is not funding these projects. The US imports mostly from these countries…. the UAE is not one of them

http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/petroleum/data_publications/company_level_imports/current/import.html

Enough with this “we buy oil from people who hate us”. No We Don’t!

When the west builds monuments or architectural wonders, we applaud. When Arabs do it, we sneer. Isn’t that just racism speaking. Look at Vegas. Everything they built there was a wonder. No bleep from anyone. As a matter of fact the rest of the world admired the “vision”.

So bravo to the leaders of Dubai and the rest of the emirates that spend their capital on improving infrastructure and standard of living.

As for the workers that do all the labor, at least they weren’t brought in by ships (American slaves), plus they are paid wages, unlike the slaves that worked our cotton fields.

Wooow
badmoon thanks for you response.
Dubai has to be admired whether people like it or not
Thanks

This is going to be a great achievement! And all the while failing to abide by any basic human rights.

Where will they put the death ray?

Interesting that it\\\’s impossible to discuss urban planning or architecture without acommpanying dialogue about $$$, race, human rights etc etc. This is completely reasonable. Ultimately any architectural model for urban growth can be horific or fantastic depending on how it is used and who is housed there. For example while we decry the large public housing projects of western cities, we are actually building on the same model for the middle class and marketing them as condos. So this argument can only ever go sideways.

However we can at least look closely at any effort to reduce our planetary footprint. My major beef with this type of visionary project is that it will never be built and the real challenge is how to deal with the mess we already have in front of us. How does Dubai (or anywhere else) deal with the current inefficient and wasteful land-use paradigms in an way that can be incrementally developed without wasting what we have already built.

I love the concept but why is the structure’s surface so antithetical to natural beauty? Wouldn’t this be a better design if the exterior were to emulate a natural landscape, offer habitat for compatible wildlife like birds, bees and bats and recreation and stellar views for the inhabitants. Why do architects always seem to impose the flat inorganic surface of post industrial revolutionary industrial products on structures that could just as easily support a forest and waterfalls?

[...] a completely self-sustaining city, the Superstar will be capable of housing 15,000 people. It will grow its own food, recycle all of [...]

This probably won’t get built. If it does, it probably won’t get finished.

Why does everyone refuse believe that large numbers of people can live on a small area of land together? With the collaboration of the some of the greatest architectural and engineering minds of the time, do you honestly think that an “arcology” such as this would even be seriously considered for construction if it did not take into consideration the fact that people don’t want to live like sardines in a can? The point of these types of structures is to build UP, thus reducing the amount or area of land used for housing, and increase the amount of land available for agriculture, forestry and the like, by allowing people to live comfortably ON TOP of each other, not crammed into the same space. For those who have the “I hate city living and need my space and peace and quiet” attitude, you need to realize that this little blue speck of a planet we live on just ain’t big enough for everyone to have their own “forty acres and a mule” and still survive with regards to food and water shortage, as well as pollution and waste.. I suggest to all of those who are still unconvinced, go do a bit of googling on Paolo Soleri and his ideal arcology concept. It IS!!! one of the best solutions (if not the best) to rapidly expanding global population and environment preservation out there. ‘nuf said.