Friday, October 02, 2009

Dubai ... our first trip! What's the tallest and who's the most luxurious?

Tallllllllllllllll !

At 818 metres, with 160 habitable floors ... this is one REALLY tall fella, surpassing Taipei's "101" (Which is dwarfed now, as its "only" 500-plus metres). Funny that we were there the DAY AFTER the exterior was completed ... Our first ever trip to Dubai, 116km from Abu Dhabi. Nice relaxed one hour drive on a Friday morning ...

The cost? 4 BILLION US Dollars ... OUCH!


Juliansi.blogspot.com
I had a real chuckle when I read the article below, not about the record and the fierce rivalry between the 2 buildings, but the bit on Abu Dubai ... did they mean Dubai, or Abu Dhabi. Hah!

National Post, Toronto
Toronto’s glorious CN Tower may have lost some of its international allure when an upstart Abu Dubai office tower took its title as world’s tallest structure, but it will not have its name stricken entirely from the Guinness Book of World Records.
Guinness record keepers announced today the CN Tower, at 553.3 metres, is still considered the world’s tallest tower. This despite the United Arab Emirates’ Burj Dubai measuring in at 818 metres.
The confusion, and the apparent moral victory for the CN Tower, extends from complicated guidelines used to gauge building classification, and the fact that the CN Tower may have been over-hyping its position as the world’s tallest building.
Because the CN Tower does not have floors to house people, aside from the observation deck, it is officially classified as a telecommunications tower, not a building.
“The CN Tower has never been, from our perspective, classed as a building in the conventional sense. A building occupies people and needs to have floors,” said Antony Wood, the executive director of the Chicago-based Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat.
“The Burj Dubai is a lot higher than the CN Tower. It is the world’s tallest building, tallest freestanding structure, tallest whatever you want to call it. Except one thing it is not, it is not a telecommunications tower… if you go back to the original category of world’s tallest telecommunications tower, then [the CN Tower] probably still is.”




Pure indulgence!

The Burj Al Arab stands on an artificial island 280 m (920 ft) out from Jumeirah beach, and is connected to the mainland by a private curving bridge. It is an iconic structure, designed to symbolize Dubai's urban transformation and to mimic the sail of a boat.


It cost ... 650 Million US Dollars.
A night's stay is no less then 1,000 USD!
This shot ... FREE :-) As seen from the Jumeirah area public beach.

2 comments:

Ciki said...

Yarrr .. but i heard that due to a technicality (no lesen or something like dat).. they are NOT the tallest rite? haha.. has that license issue been sorted out ar?

Julian Si said...

I found a write-up describing which category the Burj is the tallest in :-) just for you! Updated my blog entry ... read on the article excerpt from Toronto newspapers :-)