Following six years of construction, the Moshe Safdie-designed Raffles City Chongqing
is nearing completion in China. Representing a genuinely impressive
engineering achievement, the so-called horizontal skyscraper consists of
a cluster of eight towers and a huge connecting skybridge. Developer
CapitaLand reports that it's now structurally complete and work is
ongoing finishing its interior. The official opening ceremony is
expected to take place in the second half of 2019.
Reminiscent of Safdie's Marina Bay Sands,
but even more ambitious, Raffles City Chongqing also involves
engineering firm Arup. Its unusual design is inspired by the sails of
the Chinese trading vessels that once plied their trade in the busy
river that runs through the city.
The
scale of the project is considerable, with a total floorspace of
817,000 sq m (roughly 8.8 million sq ft), spread over its eight towers.
The curved skybridge, dubbed the Crystal, is its focal point and is
supported by four 250 m (820 ft)-tall skyscrapers. It also connects
another pair of 350 m (1,148 ft)-tall skyscrapers via two adjoining
smaller skybridges.
The
Crystal measures 300 m (984 ft) in length, which, if made vertical,
would be almost the height of the Eiffel Tower. It's clad in roughly
3,000 glass panels and almost 5,000 aluminum panels.
To
get the Crystal into position some 250 m (820 ft)-high, it was divided
into nine segments. Four pieces were built in place atop the towers and
three middle segments were prefabricated on the ground and hoisted into
place. The end pieces were mostly assembled in place, with finishing
sections also hoisted up from the ground.
The
Crystal's interior will include two swimming pools, a gallery, large
gardens with trees, and restaurants, and a viewing point, among other
amenities.
The
rest of Raffles City Chongqing will host residential and office space,
as well as a shopping mall and a large landscaped site measuring 9.2
hectares (22.7 acres).
Check out the video below to see the towers rising and sections of the skybridge being hoisted into position.
Source: CapitaLand/New Atlas
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