What makes Burj Khalifa, an icon of Dubai City

12 May, 2012 | By Nirmal Manandhar

For the modern world, Burj Khalifa is not a new name now as it holds the record for the tallest ever building, been built in the human history. After opening in 2010, its still standing as the worlds tallest tower till date and may keep its pride for few more years. As Freud described height is an expression and a metaphor of ambition, but equally, falling is a universal fear. Considering the competition for being the tallest building on earth, we might wonder how long the record of Burj Khalifa will stand for. The tallest structure in the world was finally located back in the Arab world since 1311 when the spire of Lincoln Cathedral topped the Great Pyramid. The competition for the worlds tallest buildings used to be within Europe and United States before 35 years, but it has now shifted outside, as all new tallest towers being built around Asian world. The Burj Khalifa swiped the record from Taipei 101 in Taipei, Taiwan. Taipei 101 surpassed the Petronas Towers in 2004 that overtook Chicago's Willis Tower in 1998.

Fig.1. Comparing the worlds tallest

The Burj is located at 1 Emaar Boulevard, Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Architecture has been booming in this part of the world and Dubai turned overnight into city of super-skyscrapers. Dubais glamour and economic tourism has increasingly relied upon the spectacle of larger and more extravagant undertakings. In a way, Dubai has been exuberant in a sense to keep its name in the modern world. The Burj is a national icon and a symbol of Dubai city. The project was conceived in early 2003, which was revised in May 2003 when Chicago based firm Skidmore, Owings and Merrill (SOM) released a new stunning design. The design was inspired from minarets and harmonious structure of native plant called Hymenocallis. Some critics also claim that the design was influenced by Frank Lloyd Wright's 1956 plans for the Illinois Sky-City in Chicago. The tower was designed by the architect Adrian Smith and the engineer William Baker, both of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM). Architect Smith is known as the specialist for skyscrapers and his support for the philosophy of contextualism. Unfortunately Architect Smith left the firm during construction to open his own Consultancy, and Baker and his team led to the completion of the project.
Fig. 2. The Burj (2010) Vs Illinois Sky-City (unbuilt -1956)

The construction started in January 2004 and officially completed and opened in January 4th, 2010. The height of the building wasnt released until the opening day of the Burj, which seemed for obvious reasons regarding competition and financial issues. Had Dubai not ran out of funds, who knows it has reached more heights than present? There is an interesting fact behind renaming the Burj Khalifa from Burj Dubai. During the construction of the Burj, Dubai city ran out of finance and halted for about six-months. The project was finally completed with the help of Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the ruler of Abu Dhabi that led the tower to be referred as the Burj Khalifa. The Burj has been described as A Living Wonder or A Vertical City. Burj is the world's tallest man-made structure or building, which makes it A Living Wonder. Around 12,000 residents and a further 20,000 people will be living and working within the tower making it so called A Vertical City. Being a mixed-use tower, the Burj becomes one of the first skyscrapers to include residential spaces within. The Burj features luxurious residences, commercial suites including the worlds first Armani Hotel and Armani Residences. The tower has an array of luxurious amenities including four swimming pools, an exclusive residents lounge, Sky Lobbies on the 43rd, 76th and 123rd levels, fitness facilities including a health centre, wellness facility, thermal suites and a spa measuring 12,000 sq.ft. The worlds highest fine dining restaurant Atmosphere, Burj Khalifa is located at level 122, which is the highest restaurant in the world. At the top on the 124th floor, is the worlds highest observatory with an outdoor terrace, offering a spectacular view of the entire city including burj-ul-arab, dubai mall, dubai fountains, souk al bahar, the airport, the beach etc. In order to illustrate the supremacy of the Burj, it is obvious to study in depth the design considerations of the structure that led to the standing of this monument. The Form of The Building The design inspiration of the Burj Khalifa combines historical and cultural influences with the exceptional technology to achieve an outstandingly tall building. SOM has been successful to apply a rigorous geometry to the tower, which aligns all the common central core and column elements to form a building. The tower is remarkably tall and remarkably thin and has innovative structural system: a sixsided core of concrete buttressed by massive concrete walls, which indeed support the three wings of the Y-shaped skyscraper. The first twenty floors from the ground are fairly bulky but as it rises up there is a spiralling
Fig.3. Innovative Base of the building supporting 828 meters of Structure above it

sequence of setbacks. The setbacks are so organized that the building stepping is accomplished by aligning columns above with walls below to provide a smooth load path. This allows the construction to proceed without the normal delays associated with column transfers. When tower reaches one-third towards the top, it gracefully metamorphoses into a slender building and further narrows to a central section remains. Fig.4. Wind Flow Around the Tower Confusing the One advantage of this configuration is, as the Wind buildings shape varies at each level, wind cannot create an organized vortex around it, and stress on the structure is reduced. The setbacks are set to confuse the wind as the design team describes. Another major requirement for the successful completion of this project was the technology used to pump the concrete slurry to a height of 600 meters in a short enough time span (around 30 minutes) to ensure the concrete remained workable and retained its high performance properties. Foundation South Korean Samsung Engineering & Construction, who completed the projects Taipei 101 and Petronas Twin Towers were involved in the construction of the foundation of the Burj. They created a 3.7 m thick reinforced concrete raft as the foundation, which was supported by 194 numbers of bored reinforced concrete piles. Each bored cast-inplace pile is 1.5 meters in diameter and 43 meter long with a capacity of 3000 tonnes. Vertical Transport 57 elevators, and 8 escalators have been installed within the Burj including the fastest elevators in the world with a speed of 64 km/h. How does it shift a lot of people a vertical kilometre without a jetpack? The answer is a staggered device: vertical ascents, which are divided into sections. In case of emergency or fire, pressurized, air-conditioned refuge areas are provided every 25 floors.

Fig.5. Giant Foundation for Giant Tower

Fig.6. Vertical Transport of the Burj

External Cladding Burj Khalifas cladding system is constructed to high standards to reduce the transfer of external heat gains. The exterior cladding of Burj Khalifa is made of reflective aluminum and textured stainless steel spandrel panels with numerous small tubular fins. This design is supposed to resist the strong desert heat and solar rays better. It is an interesting fact that under normal conditions, and when all building maintenance units are in operation, it will take three to four months to clean the entire exterior facade. Imagine, the glasses well enough to cover 17 football stadiums have been used in the structure. Seismic Design How does such a tall building resist earthquake? The engineers say there is no threat, since the Burj's structure is inherently stable with its tapering profile and cautious weight distribution, making it at least in theory, secure. The summit, they say, where the residential floors are only eight metres across, is as secure as a knitting needle set in concrete. Indeed, the Burj dispenses with a pendulum-like mass damper, which some supertalls use to moderate incidental movements. Sustainable Design Sustainability of the buildings has been the main topic of the century leading most of the developed countries to rethink about the Carbon emission from the building. Architect Smith defends his building as the sustainable design presenting the fact skyscrapers such as Burj Khalifa are inherently sustainable as they accommodate a large number of people on a small footprint. And further, deep foundations make them ideal for geothermal heating and radiant cooling systems. High rises also make efficient use of building-integrated photovoltaic systems to absorb solar power and generate energy as they are less likely to have shadows casted on them. The Burj uses solar panels to heat 140,000 litres of water every day in approximately 7 hours of daytime solar radiation. Cooler air temperatures, reduced air density, and reduced relative humidity at the top of the building allow for sky-sourced sustainability innovations. According to experts, when ventilation air is withdrawn at the top of the building, it requires less energy for air conditioning, ventilation, and dehumidification.

In a nutshell, the Burj Khalifa, like most super-tall skyscrapers, looks best from afar and most admits the tower is a stunning piece of architecture. In fact it is beautifully sleek and elegant, rising in a graceful series of silver tubes of different heights. Critics claimed Burj as the beautiful combination of art and technology. The Burj Khalifa has three hundred thousand square meters of interior space, which sounds like a lot, but in fact it is forty thousand square meters less than the Shanghai World Financial Center, which is fifty-nine stories shorter. The Burj Dubai might be a triumph vertically, but what about the horizontal? And, beyond the height, is there anything to celebrate or the Burj Dubai symbolizes catastrophic excess of money and ambition. And, what about the background that surrounds the Burj, is it as equally appealing as the Burj itself?

References:
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