Dubai plans "moving" skyscraper

[antigop]

Source: BBC News

The world's first moving building, an 80-storey tower with revolving floors giving a shifting shape, will be built in Dubai, its architect says.

The Dynamic Tower design is made up of 80 pre-fabricated apartments which will spin independently of one another.

"It's the first building that rotates, moves, and changes shape," said architect David Fisher, who is Italian, at a news conference in New York.

"This building never looks the same, not once in a lifetime," he added.

The 420-metre (1,378-foot) building's apartments would spin a full 360 degrees, at voice command, around a central column by means of 79 giant power-generating wind turbines located between each floor.

Read more: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7472722.stm

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You can watch an animation at the link.

[polichick]

1. Has Cheney reserved an apartment yet??

[antigop]

2. Well, he could afford one. They start at $3.7 million n/t

[polichick]

3. Dubai is the fantasy playground of oil people from around the world...

I've always thought Cheney would move there asap ~ where the long arm of U.S. law can't reach him.

[heliarc]

18. It's also where Halliburton is moving their corporate offices.

All the more reason for Cheney to have an apartment there.

[SteppingRazor]

6. Sweet. I'm buying five. n/t

[snooper2]

4. What a fucking waste of money

and natural resources for building that POS...

Yeah, spinning floors, real practical

[Javaman]

10. And energy. nt

[SeattleGirl]

20. I thought I heard the designer talk about the floors turning on wind

power.

[frog92969]

5. Why?

:shrug:

[SteppingRazor]

7. I think, when it comes to the sort of rarified social class you're talking about here...

the question is not, "Why?" The question is, "Why not?"

[SergeyDovlatov]

13. Oil will run out. They are trying to turn themselves into a tourist destination n/t

[Baclava]

8. That's cool as shit

I don't care who you are.

[Wizard777]

9. Awesome! Welcome to Rubik Apartments.

Or is that Arubik Apartments? That building reminds me of a Rubik's Cube without the different colors. So that's where the Republicans outsourced American innovation too. They sent it packing to Dubai. It used to be America that wild innovations like this and building islands in the ocean came out of. Not any more. Now the only thing America manufactures is Harley Davidson's and Bush shit excuses for war.

[Baclava]

12. Follow the oil money....

[SergeyDovlatov]

14. Only 3% of their revenue comes from OIL. Most of their money is from Jebel Ali Free Zone

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tourism_in_Dubai

Tourism in Dubai is an important part of the Dubai government's strategy to maintain the flow of foreign dollars into the emirate. Dubai's lure for tourists is based mainly on shopping, but also on its possession of other ancient and modern attractions.

Dubai is the second most populous emirate of the seven emirates of United Arab Emirates after Abu Dhabi. It is distinct from other members of the UAE in that revenues from oil account for only 3% of its gross domestic product. A majority of the emirate's revenues are from the Jebel Ali Free Zone (JAFZ) <1> and now, increasingly, from tourism.

[Baclava]

15. It's just another desert shithole to me.....they can have it.

If I want 110 degress and 100% humidity I'll just go to Panama.

The people are much friendlier....and you can drink everywhere.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

22. Oh... you've been there?

[Baclava]

25. I've been all over the M.E., it's all the same. UAE? No thanks

Man Thrown In Jail In Dubai, For Having 0.003 Grams Of Cannabis Stuck To His Shoe

A Briton, traveling through Dubai on his way to England, was arrested and sentenced to 4 years in jail, for having a microscopic piece of cannabis stuck to the bottom of one of his shoes. Keith Brown by name, this guy was stopped while he was walking through the Dubai airport and searched with high tech equipment.

The search revealed a piece of cannabis on the bottom of one of his shoes, too small to be seen with the naked eye, weighing only 0.003 grams.

With their zero-tolerance policy when it comes to drugs, UAE did this kind of thing before. Just to show you how insane this is, another man was thrown in jail in the past for having in his possession three poppy seeds, left from a lunch he had before he left England.

http://www.absoluterandom.com/man-thrown-in-jail-in-dubai-for-having-0003-grams-of-cannabis-stuck-to-his-shoe/

[Wizard777]

16. Their oil reserves are about to run dry. Dubai will not be in the oil industry for much longer.

So their ride on the crude oil gravy train is comming to an end. The Emir is looking to replace that oil income by turning Dubai into a world class tourist Mekka. They are creating some world class curiosities (you have to see it to believe it type things.)They have even built an Ice Bar. Everything inside the bar is made of Ice. The bar, the seats, the art, the plates, and the glasses all made of Ice. There is even a temperate zone to keep you from stroking out as you go from the 120 to -20 degree temperatures. They have pools with wave machines that allow you to surf in the pool. The Emir of Dubai has become a Walt Disney on steroids. He is innovating in very much the same way Walt Disney did. It would not surpize me one bit if the Emir commissioned a gold star panel to nothing but study the life of Walt Disney. I now look at Dubai with the exact same awe I once saw Disney World with. That started in a desolate Swamp in Florida. It was a great curiosity. You could hear all about it and even see pictures of it. But it just didn't do it justice. You just had to go there to truly apreciate the Disney World experience. That's exactly what Dubai is going for. It will be far more than a destination. It will be an experience that lasts a life time.

[Baclava]

17. 'The Ice Bar'

uh.....cool?

[Demeter]

21. I've Been There Several Times in 40 Years, and I Still Can't Appreciate the Disney Experience

So skip me.

[dixiegrrrrl]

11. Ya know, if it spins fast enuff

it can produce its own electricity. :silly:

Ever been on the Space Needle, btw?

[SergeyDovlatov]

19. Yep. Having a couple of cocktails on the top of space needle, speeds up spinning by a LOT!n/t

[sentelle]

23. did anyone notice?

The architect has never built a building before. This isn't architecture, its talkitecture, its marketing, not engineering. And then says it will be up by 2010. Not happening.

[Chuggo]

24. Actually, pretty impressive.

[mdmc]

26. Those guys are always doing something down there

very busy