So we have a tall building do we?

As Dubai's Burj Tower opens we compare it with Beetham Tower

Published on January 5th 2010.

Here's a chart of how big we aren't.

But would we want a vast Burj tower such as the bankrupt autocracy of Dubai can build through semi-enslaved indentured labour?

The stats are jaw-dropping.The Burj stands some 800 metres (2,625 feet) high with 160 floors and can hold some 12,000 people. It is twice the height of the Empire State Building and 600ft higher than Kinder Scout the tallest peak of the Peak District National Park. Beetham Tower is 169 metres (554ft) high with 47 floors.The Burj tower houses 1,044 luxurious (and expensive) apartments, 37 stories of business/retail space, 160 hotel rooms, a number of swimming pools, a library, valet parking, a cigar club, and a fitness centre.

At its busiest, the site employed 12,000 workers, clocking up 22-million man hours to complete the structure since construction began in 2004. Remember most of these workers are indentured - under contract for a fixed period of time in exchange for transportation, food, clothing and lodging. They live in terrible conditions and earn a pitance with long hours. They're not allowed to go swanning around the finer areas of Dubai of course, and to return home to the Subcontinent, South East Asia and so on they have to buy back their contract with interest. Which they haven't got the money to do. So they work their full term trapped in a half life.

That aside the tower is a stunning technical achievement. The developers have said that 90 per cent of the accommodation on the 200 storeys has already been sold. But they would wouldn't they?So would we want one in Manchester?

Half the Confidential office says no, and half says yes, bring it on. We could put it on that island between the Ship Canal and the Bridgewater Canal on the way to Old Trafford, it would look grand. No idea what we might fill it with though. Snow perhaps? Or maybe make it a detention centre for the bankers who bankrupted the country?

Oddly enough there is a weird sort of Manchester link with the Burj. The architects were Skidmore, Owings and Merrill. This long-lived practice designed the Inland Steel Building in Chicago in the fifties. This in turn impressed GS Hay and Gordon Tait who in Manchester designed the CIS Tower. Confidential hears that Skidmore, Owings and Merrill are far prouder of that connection than over the construction of Burj Tower.

But then again we hear a lot of things.

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19 comments so far, continue the conversation, write a comment.

Peter RivendellJanuary 5th 2010.

Let there be skyscrapers! The canal island is a fantastic spot crying out for some fantastic bit of development - and all within reach of a handy (if windswept) metrolink stop.

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So we have a tall building do we?

As Dubai's Burj Tower opens we compare it with Beetham Tower

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