This Epic Skybridge is Being Built in Melbourne

this is one of the most eye-catching skyscraper designs of recent years and at first glance you might not be entirely sure what you're seeing the renders show a pair of towers that seem to be wrapped together in gold like the world's biggest birthday present you'd be forgiven for thinking the architects were just having fun but what looks like a bit of decoration is actually a key part of the overall structural design head down to central melbourne where these towers are now rising and you'll see there was no trick that strip of gold is going to be a sky bridge but building something like this 40 stories above the ground is far from easy and the team trying to make it happen are grappling with extreme height complex structural forces and ambitious architectural design and the eyes of the world looking on this is how engineers in australia are building the world's most impressive sky bridge [Music] it's no secret that skyscraper developers have been going to ever more extreme lengths to get their buildings in the spotlight we've seen them get taller thinner and just plain weirder but there's another category of construction which is helping new structures get noticed sky bridges they link two or more buildings together above ground creating a connected structure yes they've been around for a while some believe as far back as the 1600s and they've become a common sight in many towns and cities but recently there's been a big leap forward in what's possible at the higher and taller end of the scale 2019 saw the completion of raffle city chongqing which has an almost 300 meter long sky bridge called the crystal balanced across four towers in 2020 jumeirah gate in dubai followed up with the world's highest occupiable skybridge floor then in 2021 we saw the world's longest cantilever also in dubai lifted into place at one zabil now while it might not be the biggest longest heaviest or highest sky bridge we've seen this new effort in australia will become a serious horizontal highlight when it completes in 2022. it's part of a project at 308 exhibition street which began construction in late 2018. the site will host two skyscrapers designed by cox architecture and fender catsalidis each rising over 200 meters tower one called sapphire by the gardens is set to house apartments while tower 2 will boast a luxury shangri-la hotel as well as being a way to get from one tower to the next the sky bridge will boast private dining rooms lounges and a glass floor offering some pretty scary views down to the city below it'll wrap around one whole level of the apartment building before stepping up to envelop two floors of the hotel there's a structural element here as well both towers need the sky bridge to create a rigid link between them and that will allow them to share wind loads and seismic forces as you might have guessed building such a unique connection between two skyscrapers over 40 floors above the ground is a pretty serious challenge to form the sky bridge steel beams and metal form worker being used to make the concrete slab a structure which will also support the cladding underneath inside the slab steel tendons will stretch from one tower to the next holding them together and creating that fixed link steel beams will also be used for the bridge's roof with a movement joint on one side allowing for any minor differential movement but before any of this can happen a plywood deck has to be installed this offers protection and a platform for adding the slab steel work which is divided into seven pre-assembled modules and the lower cladding the concrete will then be poured in two phases once it's strong enough the steel tendons can be stressed in a process known as post tensioning and the towers will then be locked together with steel ties at this point work can continue on the upper levels of the towers themselves after post tensioning is complete the temporary steel ties are removed and the facades and cladding can be installed the wooden deck is then taken out and the gaps left behind are filled in as these pictures show work on the sky bridge had already started in early 2022 and it's due to complete later this year yes the sky bridge is pretty epic but it isn't the only interesting part of this project when construction began the excavation and piling were followed by one of the largest concrete pools in melbourne's history the stuff was spread three meters deep over a 1 000 square meter area and that took 469 truckloads of concrete on top of that there are railway tunnels running beneath the site to think about all this engineering work look sets deliver quite a payoff multiplex the main construction firm building sapphire by the gardens has described it as melbourne's most exclusive address that's quite a statement the city now the fastest growing in australia is already home to several other luxury skyscrapers there are more tall buildings here than in any other city on the continent over 60 skyscrapers are complete and at least 10 more are being built right now with more people choosing to live here than ever before and many wanting to be as close as possible to the center there's new demand for high-rise developments like this the towers aren't your average apartment block or hotel they overlook the historic royal exhibition building and carlton gardens a unesco world heritage site giving panoramic views of the grounds and melbourne's central business district sapphire's duel in the crown will be its 1200 square meter super penthouse developer s p satia says it's the largest on the market in australia and it currently has an asking price of 39 million australian dollars as well as the sky bridge the two skyscrapers are going to be linked at the base too through a 10 story combined podium when the whole thing finishes the project will become the latest member of melbourne's increasingly crowded skyscraper club but the newcomer won't have to work hard to stand out with its prominent location and clear visual impact it'll likely be impossible to miss if you enjoyed this video and you want to get more from the definitive video channel for construction make sure you subscribe to the b1m [Music]

Channel: The B1M

Views: 703,941

Keywords: B1M, TheB1M, Construction, architecture, engineering, The B1M, Fred Mills, building, skyscrapers, skybridges, australia, melbourne, multiplex, sapphire by the gardens, shangri-la, dubai, one za'abeel, jumeirah gate, raffles city chongqing, chongqing, china, milan, penthouses, hotels, luxury buildings, sp setia, fender katsalidis, cox architecture, suzhou

Id: tBgn2jxhYQ4

Length: 6min 20sec (380 seconds)

Published: Wed Mar 30 2022