The True Scale of the World's Tallest Buildings

[Music] few things say big quite like a skyscraper while structures like bridges and dams are physically larger the abundance proximity and presence of skyscrapers in our everyday lives is a near constant reminder of just how small we really are [Music] skyscrapers are mainly built to add much needed space to cities and urban areas so it seems a myth that our standard for ranking them is based almost exclusively on height when that doesn't explain just how big they really are or how much space they offer to better appreciate the immense scale of these structures we've compared the gross floor area of some of the world's tallest buildings with easily relatable references and to one another revealing that taller doesn't necessarily mean bigger forget what you've been told we're here to prove once and for all that size really does matter to accurately measure the size of each building we've used the council on tool buildings and urban habitats methodology which takes into account the total gross floor area within a tower's footprint while excluding adjoining podiums connected buildings or other towers within the overall development this means that while the venetian in macau detroit's renaissance center and singapore's marina bay sands are often listed as being over 500 000 square meters in size this is a cumulative area across multiple conjoined towers and it's not representative of a single skyscraper beginning with what's arguably our planet's most recognizable skyscraper the empire state building was a true titan of its time when it took the title of world's tallest building in 1931 standing 62 meters taller than its predecessor the sheer bulk of the empire state was unmatched with 209 000 square meters of space within its walls nearly double that of the chrysler building adding more than 29 football pitches of space to manhattan's real estate market the empire state building contains a floor area equivalent to that bound by 33rd and 42nd street between 5th and 6th avenue though the empire state took the titles of the world's tallest and largest skyscraper when it completed the double accolade would not be awarded to the world's tallest buildings moving into the 21st century undeniably the tallest structure ever built by man few skyscrapers better illustrate the disparity between height and overall size than the world's current tallest building dubai's 828 metre burj khalifa easily eclipsing all others in terms of height the building's three-wing layout and stepped-back profile used to disrupt wind loads and make its extreme height possible came at the expense of overall floor area while the 309 500 square meters of space within the burj is enough to park 18 531 cars in terms of area it comes in well behind the world's second and even third tallest skyscrapers with shanghai tower and the makka royal clock tower containing 420 000 and 310 000 square meters of space respectively in fact when ranking the world's largest skyscrapers based on their gross floor area the burj khalifa doesn't even crack the top ten instead it's pushed to 15th place by the likes of the exchange in kuala lumpur and chicago's aeon center with so much attention being paid to the super slender skyscrapers rising along new york's billionaires row in recent years a true behemoth of the big apple has managed to seemingly sneak onto the skyline relatively unnoticed [Music] taking the title of the largest skyscraper in new york city from one world trade center by more than 36 000 square meters 30 hudson yards contains more space than central park tower 111 w57 432 park avenue 53 w53 and 157 combined perhaps even more surprising is the amount of space or rather lack of it within the world's thinnest skyscraper soaring 435 meters above manhattan 111 west 57th street known as 111w57 will become the 26th tallest skyscraper in the world when it completes later this year but contains less than half the floor area of london's buckingham palace [Music] over in europe russia's 462 meter lacta center might be the tallest skyscraper on the continent and the 14th tallest in the world but its gross floor area of 143 400 square meters is less than that of australia's two largest skyscrapers with sydney's one barangaroo and melbourne's rialto tower containing 146 500 and 147 000 square meters of space respectively [Music] while the rialto tower has held the title of the southern hemisphere's largest skyscraper by gross floor area since 1986 it's set to lose this title when jakarta's 186 000 square meter thamarin 9 tower 1 completes in 2021 moving yet another skyscraper accolade to asia [Music] speaking of skyscraper accolades moving to asia malaysia's patronus towers marked the first time that the title of the world's tallest building had left north america when they controversially surpassed chicago's willis tower in 1998 despite being pushed into second place in terms of height the willis tower remained on top in terms of overall size with its 423 638 square meters of space exceeding both petronas towers combined with a gross floor area equivalent to 6.8 million pages of a4 or a book that's 683 meters tall the willis tower contained more space than any other single skyscraper in the world until it was superseded in 2017 by you guessed it china [Music] while china's neverlade claimed the title of the world's tallest building it's now home to the world's largest skyscraper at an unbelievable 459 000 square meters shenzhen's pinghan finance center is larger than the world's smallest sovereign state vatican city and contains enough floor space to cover 22 of monaco the world's second smallest country but for all their size the world's largest skyscrapers pale in comparison to some of the very largest buildings the pinghan finance center contains just 76 of the floor space at the pentagon 31 of the space at the world's largest single airport terminal in istanbul and just 27 of the space available at the world's largest building the new century global center in chengdu so the next time someone brags about how tall their skyscraper is just remind them that it's all about area and what you do with it not height this video was made possible by bluebeam learn more at the link below and as always if you enjoyed this video and would like to get more from the definitive video channel for construction subscribe to the b1n

Channel: The B1M

Views: 564,635

Keywords: B1M, TheB1M, Construction, architecture, engineering, The B1M, Fred Mills, building, skyscraper, worlds tallest, largest skyscraper, world record, burj khalifa, empire state building, chrysler building, comparing skyscraper, shanghai tower, shenzhen, ping an finance centre, dam that's big, world's largest buildings, world's largest dams, biggest buildings, megaproject, supertall, megatall skyscraper, floor area

Id: yhD_RYF76-4

Length: 8min 9sec (489 seconds)

Published: Wed Mar 17 2021