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As the UAE celebrates its 40th anniversary, Construction Week takes a look at the 40 projects that have helped shape the nation's infrastructure, transport services and skylines.
The UAE has an open economy with a high per capita income and a sizable annual trade surplus. Successful efforts at economic diversification have reduced the portion of GDP based on oil and gas output to 25%. Since the discovery of oil in the UAE more than 30 years ago, the UAE has undergone a profound transformation from an impoverished region of small desert principalities to a modern state with a high standard of living.
Our list is a compilation of those projects we feel have helped boost the nation's economy, standard of living and business drive. It also details a few projects that are under development and that are designed to transform the nation's future. It's not presented in any particular order, but we thought it best to start with the world's tallest tower....
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1. Burj Khalifa
Not only the tallest building on earth, but the tallest structure ever produced, the Burj Khalifa is a staggering feat of engineering that simply dwarfs anything else ever constructed.
Even within Dubai’s towering skyline, with its forest of skyscrapers lining two distinct sections of Sheikh Zayed Road, the Burj Khalifa stands out – particularly at night time when it provides a backdrop to the half-hourly fountain displays at its base.
The Burj Khalifa burst on to the international scene earlier this year with a massive fanfare, fireworks and festivities at the dawn of the new decade, after a much anticipated build. The fanfare was not without merit: the building smashing almost every record in the books – and by a considerable margin.
The Burj actually bagged several world-topping records when it was opened, including: tallest building in the world, tallest free-standing structure in the world, highest number of stories in the world, highest occupied floor in the world, highest outdoor observation deck in the world, elevator with the longest travel distance in the world, tallest service elevator in the world, world’s highest swimming pool (76th floor) and world’s highest occupied floor.
While it normally takes a day to remove a tower crane from a standard building site, it took four months to remove the top-most crane from the Burj at the end of the main construction phases.
Contractors needed to build a series of cranes, each one smaller than the last, to systematically remove them from the building.
Stats
Location: Dubai, UAE
Height: 828m
Floors: 163
Year completed: 2010
Made of: steel/concrete
Use: office / residential / hotel
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FEATURED COMMENT
How about Dubai Metro? Isn't it supposed to be among the top lists?