OOPS! Builders forgot elevator shaft in 47 story apartment building
Ron Czapala
Posts: 2,418
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/-spanish-skyscraper-going-up----without-an-elevator---214416887.html
Duh!
Duh!
If you are thinking of investing in an apartment at the Intempo skyscraper in Benidorm, Spain, be prepared to bring some good walking shoes: Its builders forgot a working elevator, says the Spanish news site El Pais.
According to a story surfaced on Gizmodo, the luxury high-rise tower, which started construction in 2007, was originally designed for 20 floors. But the the developers decided to push the design to include 47 floors with 269 homes. When completed, it will be Benidorms highest building at 650 feet.
There seemed to be just one important oversight: In going up to 47 floors, designers forgot to take into account room for an elevator shaft. El Pais reports that the architects on the project resigned in May 2012.
The building represents a long story of incompetence, according to El Pais. The coastal town had a building boom that led to the nickname Beniyork for its skyline of high-rises.
Comments
I just can't see a building that large going up without the elevators being used to bring up supplies. Though I admit, I know next to nothing about building a tall building.
I did watch "Man on a Wire" or something like that about the guy who crossed between the twin towers. The buildings were still under construction when he walked on the wire and they used a construction elevator to get the wire to the top of the building. The construction elevator was very much apart of the building.
Extending that to 47 floors might have meant:
1) The original elevator design would no longer be suitable.
2) Perhaps they forgot to add a second elevator. A taller building, over twice the traffic, needs more capacity.
There is a moral here for those who construct software.
1) You design and build a beautiful software that meets all the original requirements.
2) Marketing then demands just one more little feature.
3) No one realizes that that "one little feature" requires a total redesign of the product. Except the guys who have to code it but who listens to them
4) In the time available the little feature is hacked on as best it can be.
5) The final shipped product hardly functions.
Happens all the time.
When I was in High School I worked as a construction laborer for a couple of summers. From what I recall the crane that hauled the majority of the building material (concrete, steel reinforcement, bricks, blocks, etc.) extended up from what would become the building's elevator shaft, and an external lift/elevator was used by the construction workers and to haul smaller items like paint, flooring, windows, etc. Hard to believe a building that tall could be put up without a crane and the support the elevator shaft and surrounding building provides for the crane.
Could be done, but it would be ugly and expensive. The hallways are normally in the center of the building so at least part of one apartment on each floor would probably be needed for access.
I am just wondering how accurate the story is. I know it's hard to believe something on the internet or in a newspaper could be inaccurate, but it might be possible. It could be that the elevator shaft is in the building, in which case elevators could still be installed.
That's at least easier to fix than forgetting the shaft and elevator altogether. It may require rebuilding the lift room and using stacked cars, but probably doable.
Structural features, like foundations and basic strength of the structure. Might just have to bring it down before it collapses with people in it.
Just finished one exactly like that. Went to production today. Now, we already have "specs" to re-do it (this will be iteratiion 3) again to solve the problems created by hacking on the 2nd iteration. Well, heck, for a contractor it's called Job Security - my contract just got extended six months. Go figure. :-)
Confusion and corruption seem to go hand in hand and the news media is enjoying feeding the frenzy.
http://elpais.com/elpais/2013/07/26/inenglish/1374847176_128236.html
So I find it annoying that the article claims no elevator was included in the original design. The journalism is really trying to create a story of incompetence where something else is far more likely. A lot of people absconded with a lot of money by keeping this failure as 'a work in progress'.
I suspect that changing a building from 20 to 47 floors during construction simply indicates that the local government and the financial backers were corrupt from the beginning and that they issued a 20 floor permit to get the project started and then let the developers continue to go higher... the building might be quite sound.
I guess the real question is whether the elevator shafts are too small. I suspect they exist and with the right elevators they might do fine. But that would also presume that the local government has in some way suddenly learned to responsibly manage such a project.
I'd think twice before buying property in Spain.
BTW, if you really want to figure out how they got to 46 floors, I would investigate the company that provided the concrete and take a good look at their books.
They could always remove the top 26 floor and revert to the original design. But no one wants to admit that they made quite a bit of money building something was a farce from the beginning.