It's time to build something big

Part 2: Building a huge cabin with my own hands

Part 3: I Spent 8 Days on the ROOF Building My Dream Wooden House

Zelensky, BlackRock CEO agree to coordinate efforts to rebuild Ukraine

28.12.2022 12:00

President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky and Larry Fink, CEO of the world's largest investment company BlackRock, discussed the coordination of efforts of potential investors and participants in the reconstruction of Ukraine.

The meeting was held in a video conference format, Ukrinform reports, referring to the president’s press service.

According to the preliminary agreements between Volodymyr Zelensky and Larry Fink, the BlackRock team has been working for several months on a project to advise the Ukrainian government on how to structure the country’s reconstruction funds.

The President and BlackRock CEO agreed to focus in the near term on coordinating the efforts of all potential investors and participants in the reconstruction of Ukraine, channelling investment into the most relevant and impactful sectors of the Ukrainian economy.

During the conversation, it was emphasized that certain BlackRock leaders plan to visit Ukraine next year.

The President thanked Larry Fink for the work of the professional team that BlackRock formed to structure the reconstruction projects.

As reported, the Ministry of Economy signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the investment company BlackRock to agree a framework for consultative assistance regarding the development of a special platform for attracting private capital to restore Ukraine and support the economy.

Photo: President’s Office

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Uganda's president pledges support for unfinished Adventist church

The unfinished Kikandwa Seventh-day Adventist Church in Uganda. [photo courtesy of the Uganda Union]

YOWERI MUSEVENI CONTRIBUTES RESOURCES FOR THE CONSTRUCTION OF A CHURCH IN CENTRAL UGANDA.

June 17, 2015 | Kampla, Uganda | Samuel Mwebaza, Uganda Union Communication Director

President Yoweri K. Museveni has pledged to support the unfinished Kikandwa Seventh-day Adventist Church in the Central Uganda Conference. The president’s pledge came when he made a stopover to the church in Kikandwa to pay his respects to the late Babumba Luttamaguzi Edidian who was brutally killed in 1981. The president was on his way to Dwaniro in Kiboga district to commemorate the Heroes Day, which honors the struggle to liberate Uganda.

President Museveni pledged to contribute 200 bags of cement and 200 pieces of iron sheets towards the completion Kikandwa Adventist Church. Pastor Moses Kalibbala, who was on the ground when the president visited, expressed his appreciation of behalf of the church and also offered a prayer for him. While speaking to Kalibbala on phone, he has confirmed that all the 200 bags of cement promised were delivered on June 11, and the that the iron sheets were on their way. Kalibbala said the church is working tirelessly to complete the plastering and roofing work for the church.

The land for the Kikandwa Adventist church was donated by the family of the late Babumba Luttamaguzi, a former Seventh-day Adventist prominent church member, who together with several other church members and close friends were killed by government forces in 1981 their homes, which were in the neighborhood of the Kikandwa Adventist church.

It is believed that during this time, president Museveni was hiding in one of the aforementioned home and wouldn’t have survived if the people in the home didn’t hide him.

This is not the first time President Museveni has extended similar help to the Kikandwa church. Last year 2014 in the month of July, he also made a similar stopover and also donated 200 bags of cement together with 200 iron sheets. So when he come over this time and found work was not yet completed, he then directed that more help be offered to have the Church fully completed.

Source: "Adventist News Network"

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Will The New Housing Bubble That Bernanke Is Creating End As Badly As The Last One Did?

By Michael, on April 30th, 2013

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke has done it. He has succeeded in creating a new housing bubble. By driving mortgage rates down to the lowest level in 100 years and recklessly printing money with wild abandon, Bernanke has been able to get housing prices to rebound a bit. In fact, in some of the more prosperous areas of the country you would be tempted to think that it is 2005 all over again. If you can believe it, in some areas of the country builders are actually holding lotteries to see who will get the chance to buy their homes. Wow - that sounds great, right? Unfortunately, this "housing recovery" is not based on solid economic fundamentals. As you will see below, this is a recovery that is being led by investors. They are paying cash for cheap properties that they believe will appreciate rapidly in the coming years. Meanwhile, the homeownership rate in the United States continues to decline. It is now the lowest that it has been since 1995. There are a couple of reasons for this. Number one, there has not been a jobs recovery in the United States. The percentage of working age Americans with a job has not rebounded at all and is still about the exact same place where it was at the end of the last recession. Secondly, crippling levels of student loan debt continue to drive down the percentage of young people that are buying homes. So no, this is not a real housing recovery. It is an investor-led recovery that is mostly limited to the more prosperous areas of the country. For example, the median sale price of a home in Washington D.C. just hit a new all-time record high. But this bubble will not last, and when this new housing bubble does burst, will it end as badly as the last one did? (Read More....)

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NSA claims its huge datacentre won't snoop on US citizens' email

It's for 'cyber security' instead

By Lawrence Latif
Tue Apr 16 2013, 12:15

THE UNITED STATES NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY (NSA) has denied that a huge Utah datacentre will be used to monitor US citizens' email.

The NSA is building a $1.2bn datacentre in Utah that the organisation claimed is the largest defence construction project in the country since the Pentagon was built, or at least the largest it would publicly disclose.

Following a report that suggested the NSA's Utah datacentre might be used to trawl through the emails of US citizens, the NSA said its new datacentre will not be used for such activities.

Generally US authorities need to obtain a warrant before peeking at any US citizen's email. The NSA said it is "unwavering" in its respect for US laws and US citizens' civil liberties, a statement that might raise the eyebrows of some Americans.

The NSA said in a statement, "Many unfounded allegations have been made about the planned activities of the Utah Data Center. One of the biggest misconceptions about NSA is that we are unlawfully listening in on, or reading emails of, US citizens. This is simply not the case." Instead the NSA said the datacentre will be used to provide cyber security services.

The NSA tried to deflect attention from the snooping allegations by claiming that building the datacentre has created somewhere between 5,000 and 10,000 jobs, with 100 to 200 permanent jobs to keep the facility ticking over.

The NSA's Utah datacentre is scheduled to be completed in September.
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Fatal crane collapse in NYC under investigation

By DEEPTI HAJELA, Associated Press – 12 minutes ago

NEW YORK (AP) — New York City's transit agency began inspecting cranes at its construction sites throughout the city the day after one collapsed in Manhattan, killing one worker and seriously injuring another.

The collapse happened Tuesday evening in a huge pit where the Metropolitan Transportation Authority is building an extension of the No. 7 subway line beyond Times Square. It was the city's third fatal accident of its kind in four years.

The MTA said Wednesday that it had suspended all work at the site until further notice and was inspecting other cranes.

Police identified the killed worker as Michael Simermeyer, of Burlington, N.J. He was 30 and was working at the site for a subcontractor, J & E Industries. The crane was owned and operated by Yonkers Contracting Co., the MTA said.

One other person was hospitalized with a leg injury after the accident, according to the MTA.

Three other people were treated for minor injuries.

The crane was set up on the second of three levels on the construction site on Manhattan's West Side, city officials said. Fire Department officials said the boom came apart in two pieces — one 80 feet long and the other 40 feet long.

The MTA said the investigation would be conducted by the city Department of Buildings and the police department.

Jack Sullivan, a deputy chief for the fire department's emergency medical services division, said it was possible one of the workers had been struck by the crane's boom. The crane operator and someone who worked with him were among those who were injured.

He described the removal of the workers from the construction site, about 60 feet below street level, as "extremely dangerous."

"We had construction material that wasn't stable," he said.

Dozens of first responders came to the accident site.

Standing on a sidewalk, one construction laborer collapsed in tears into the arms of another worker. One laborer said, "I can't take it."

Thomas Rushkin, a retired city police officer and private investigator, said he was on his way home when he saw emergency vehicles heading over and got a glance at the pieces of the crane.
"The arm is broken in half," he said, adding that it appeared that one part of the crane was on a level below the street.

Another witness, Kennon Murphy, of Charlotte, N.C., said he was on his way to the nearby Javits Convention Center when he heard "a big boom." He said of the crane: "We noticed it was down."
Crane safety came under close scrutiny in New York in 2008, when nine people were killed in two separate catastrophic collapses in Manhattan. The owner of one of those cranes is standing trial on manslaughter charges.

Associated Press writer David B. Caruso contributed to this report.

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Under a New Steeple, a Harlem Church Gets Out From Under Debt

February 2, 2012, 6:59 AM

By DAVID W. DUNLAP

David W. Dunlap/The New York TimesThe Ephesus Seventh-Day Adventist Church on Lenox Avenue.

Let’s say something good about mortgages.

O.K. They’re flammable.

The pastors, elders and members of the Ephesus Seventh-Day Adventist Church at Lenox Avenue and West 123rd Street are so happy to be living without debt that they restaged a mortgage-burning ceremony last week just to have a photographic record.

“We’ve paid it off — praise God,” the Rev. Dedrick L. Blue, the senior pastor, said on Wednesday. The $550,000 mortgage was held by the Atlantic Union Revolving Fund, a church-affiliated lending institution. Ephesus now has a credit of $62.09, Dr. Blue said.

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  Gregory HodgeGregory Hodge

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  Willie Davis for The New York Times

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  Willie Davis for The New York Times

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  David W. Dunlap/The New York Times

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  Nancy Rutledge

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  David W. Dunlap/The New York Times

In January, church leaders restaged the mortgage burning as a photo op. In the foreground are Alvaro Stewart and the Rev. Dedrick L. Blue. Behind them, from left, are Allen Price, Melissa Preddie, Joseph Merriweather, Otis Searcy, Franz DeFreitas and John Cunningham.

What occasioned the borrowing was an ambitious project to restore the exterior of the 125-year-old church, which was badly damaged in a 1969 fire. That was when it lost the tip of its slender steeple, a Harlem landmark for generations. The steeple was not replaced during the reconstruction in the early 1970s. But it was recreated and reinstalled five years ago, in the most obvious sign of the renovation project. Other work included repointing the facade after Allen Price, the church’s building chairman, discovered there was no mortar between the stone blocks.

“The only thing that was holding this building up was gravity itself,” Dr. Blue said.

The congregation — predominantly African-American, with a good many members from the Caribbean, Central America, Brazil and West Africa — numbers about 1,200 to 1,300. Not everyone thought the church should be spending so much money on a building project, Dr. Blue conceded. But he added that the structural revitalization went hand in hand with a desire by church leaders to bridge the divide between old and new Harlem. “It’s almost a symbol; not only of what we were but of what we are becoming,” he said.

The building, designed by John Rochester Thomas, was constructed as the Second Collegiate Church of Harlem. Ephesus has occupied it since 1930. It is included in the Mount Morris Park Historic District. Joseph Merriweather, a longtime member with personal memories of the fire, credited a Fire Department captain with having preserved the stained-glass windows.

The new steeple rode out Tropical Storm Irene last year, but so many roof tiles were damaged that water got into the pipe organ, swelling the wood and leather. It is still playable, Dr. Blue said, but much diminished. As he surveyed the main sanctuary, he envisioned a renovation that would bring back some of the 19th-century character of the original building and, among other touches, eliminate the “disco light” chandeliers installed in the 1970s.

Would such a project mean another mortgage? The pastor raised his eyebrows at the question, as if he wished the subject hadn’t come up. “To be honest with you,” he answered, “yes.”

Remember, though, that Ephesus already has $62.09 in hand.

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Laid Foundation for the Tallest Church in China

As part of celebration activity series of Suzhou Industrial Park's 17th Anniversary, the ground-breaking ceremony of SIP Catholic Church cum the Bishop's House of Suzhou Church Archdiocese was held on May 28.



The location of the church

With 1-hectare planned land area and 4,880-square-meter construction area located in the northern area of Loufeng Town, the south-western shores of Yangcheng Lake, the project is expected to be put into use around Christmas, 2012. After the completion of the project, the church tower with a spire in the height of 80 meters will be the tallest church building in current China, and by then, SIP will have put in place all the four religious cultures, namely, Buddhism, Taoism, Catholicism and Christianity.

May 30, 2011

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US housing program squanders millions

Washington Post / May 16, 2011

WASHINGTON — The federal government’s largest housing construction program for the poor has squandered hundreds of millions of dollars on stalled or abandoned projects and routinely failed to crack down on delinquent developers or the local housing agencies that funded them.


Nationwide, nearly 700 projects that were awarded $400 million have been idling for years, a Washington Post investigation found. Some have languished for a decade or longer, even as much of the country struggles with record-high foreclosures and a dramatic loss of affordable housing.


The Department of Housing and Urban Development, which oversees the nation’s housing fund, does not track the pace of construction and often fails to spot defunct deals, instead trusting local agencies to police projects.


The result is a trail of failed developments. Fields where apartment complexes were promised are empty and neglected. Houses that were supposed to be renovated are boarded up and crumbling.


A yearlong Post investigation uncovered a dysfunctional system that delivers billions of dollars to local housing agencies with few rules, safeguards, or even a reliable way to track projects. The lapses have led to widespread misspending and delays in a two-decade-old program meant to deliver decent housing to the working poor.


The Post found breakdowns at every level:


■ Local housing agencies have awarded millions to troubled developers, including novice builders, fledgling nonprofits, and groups accused of fraud or shoddy work.


■ Checks were cut even when projects were still on the drawing boards, without land, financing, or permits to move forward. In at least 55 cases, developers drew HUD money but left behind only barren lots.


■ Over all, nearly one in seven projects shows signs of significant delay. Time and again, housing agencies failed to cancel bad deals or alert HUD when projects foundered.


Source: http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2011/05/16/us_housing_program_squanders_millions/
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City plots huge land deal with U.N.

Photo by Buck Ennis.

June 13, 2010 5:59 AM

Plan: Sell East Side city properties to diplos to fund mile-long park.

By Theresa Agovino


City and state officials are crafting a byzantine plan to raise money to close a 21-block gap in the East Side waterfront promenade. The hard part is that it involves selling two city-owned office buildings, razing a playground and constructing a new tower for the United Nations.
The extraordinarily complicated proposal is still in its early stages, and it could easily fall apart as it moves forward, given all of the moving parts. Yet officials say it has a chance because it would offer a way to fulfill major, long-held goals for both the city and the U.N.: The international body would finally get the additional building it has wanted for years, and the city could add park space and waterfront amenities despite the budgetary crisis.

“This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity,” says Sarra Hale-Stern, district office director for state Sen. Liz Krueger, who is working on the proposal that's being spearheaded by the city's Economic Development Corp.

Filling the promenade's gap, which extends from East 38th to East 59th streets, would cost $150 million to $200 million. The city would finance the construction by selling two buildings on East 44th Street that it leases to the U.N. Those sales could yield anywhere from $150 million to $300 million. In addition, sources say, the city is seeking at least $75 million from the U.N. for permission to build on Robert Moses Playground, a 29,000-square-foot blacktop across East 42nd Street from the U.N., on First Avenue.

Trading parkland
But the deal faces numerous obstacles. The playground transaction would require state legislation because it involves eliminating parkland. The idea would be to compensate the community for the loss by expanding the promenade and adding space to existing area parks.

“In the legislation, we are going to have to be very specific about what will be constructed if we take the major step of [removing] parkland,” says Brian Kavanagh, a state assemblyman working on the deal.

Yet getting the OK from Albany may be the easy part. The U.N. would have to approve the deal at a time when it is already spending $1.9 billion on a gut renovation of its headquarters complex.

The idea of the U.N. building on Robert Moses Playground has been kicking around for years, but two factors have resurrected the concept recently.

First, about six months ago, the U.N. hired a consultant to study its real estate needs, sources say. The consultant found that the international body needed to extend beyond its renovated headquarters and space it leases elsewhere. In fact, the U.N. is exploring moving some local employees out of the area. Such a move by a major employer would be a big blow to the city.

The U.N. is also weighing the possibility of constructing a building on its campus, on what is now green space to the north of the General Assembly Building. That's also far from ideal for the city because the U.N. sits on sovereign territory that is exempt from zoning laws, meaning local officials would have no say over what is constructed. Also, the city would be deprived of money if the U.N. built on its own land.

Long-cherished dream
Sources say the U.N. has long wanted to build on the playground site because its proximity to its headquarters means a tunnel could be created to connect the two buildings. Also, any building the U.N. constructed on the playground site couldn't be any taller than its current headquarters, sources say.

“The U.N. really wants to be in that spot, and the community really wants more parkland,” says Dan Garodnick, the local City Council member. “Hopefully, we can get a deal.”

In a statement, an EDC spokesman said the city would continue to work toward creating more open space and allowing a major employer to consolidate and expand.

Another reason behind the revived push is the possibility of using 22 caissons left behind when a temporary roadway was built while the FDR Drive was under construction. Keeping them would shave $25 million off the cost of constructing the promenade.

New York State's Department of Environmental Conservation wanted the caissons removed by the end of last year, but it has allowed them to stay as the promenade deal is being shaped. However, it is unclear when the department's patience will run out.

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Source: http://www.crainsnewyork.com/article/20100613/REAL_ESTATE/306139963

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Armani hotel opens in Burj Khalifa, world's tallest building

April 27, 2010

The world's tallest building is a little less empty.

With Tuesday's opening of a hotel designed by Giorgio Armani, the Burj Khalifa in Dubai added its first major full-time tenant, joining an observatory that recently reopened after an elevator malfunction caused it to shut down for nearly two months.

The Burj Khalifa, which rises to a record-shattering height of 2,717 feet, was designed by Chicago architects Skidmore, Owings & Merrill and former Skidmore design partner Adrian Smith, who now heads his own firm.

Still to be occupied are the skyscraper's condominiums, along with boutique offices in its upper reaches. George Efstathiou, Skidmore's managing partner on the Burj, just emailed me from Dubai that the orientation for the condo residents will occur during the first week of May with move-in towards the end of the month.

Here is more information about the hotel opening from The Economic Times.

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Source:http://featuresblogs.chicagotribune.com/theskyline/2010/04/armani-hotel-opens-in-burj-khalifa-worlds-tallest-building.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+chicagotribune%2Ftheskyline+%28ChicagoTribune+-+Cityscapes%29

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Visitors trapped in Dubai's Burj Khalifa tower days before building closed

By Michael Sheridan DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
Wednesday, February 10th 2010, 11:02 AM


View from the observation deck of Dubai's Burj Khalifa tower. An elevator became stuck there recently, trapping 15 people, according to the Associated Press.


Trapped 124 floors above the ground, a group of visitors stuck in an elevator of the massive Dubai skyscraper may have sparked the sudden closure of the world’s tallest building just a month after it opened.

Emaar Properties, the 160-story building’s developer, is keeping mum on the incident, which took place two days before the Burj Khalifa tower was shut down. But witnesses to terrifying ordeal aren't staying quiet.



Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/2010/02/10/2010-02-10_visitors_got_trapped_in_dubais_burj_khalifa_tower_days_before_building_closed.html#ixzz0f9tFjuVO
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Netanyahu risks Muslim wrath over Jerusalem holy site

Old City of Jerusalem(Archive)

Netanyahu risks Muslim wrath over Jerusalem holy site
By Akiva Eldar, Haaretz Correspondent

Will Netanyahu use a court decision to forgo a plan to alter the Mughrabi Gate? King Abdullah of Jordan is distancing himself from Israel's prime minister because of the violation of the status quo in East Jerusalem. The Turkish prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, is waiting in the corner for the slightest provocation against Islamic holy places by the Israeli government. The only trouble Benjamin Netanyahu is still missing is that of the Mughrabi Gate, at the entrance to the Temple Mount/Noble Sanctuary compound.

Whether he likes it or not, that problem is already nearing boiling point. But two weeks ago, the Jerusalem District Court supplied him with a ladder. Now, the prime minister must decide whether he wants to use it to climb down from the ramp, or whether he prefers to climb up, and gamble with what is left of Israel's relations with the Muslim world.

Next week will mark the third anniversary of the start of the salvage dig at this sensitive site, which leads to the Al-Aqsa Mosque and overlooks the Western Wall. Back then, close to 2,000 policemen accompanied archaeologists and workers to the compound. Their assignment was to prepare for restoration work at the site, after cracks were discovered in the ramp leading to the gate in 2004.

Rumors flew through the Arab world that the Jews were trying to undermine the foundations of the mosque and prepare the area for the construction of a third Temple. The Jordanian king warned that the work would undermine the stability of the Middle East. A Hamas spokesman warned that damage to the mosque would put an end to the temporary cease-fire. A few months later, a team of experts from Turkey examined the excavations and asserted that this was an attempt to destroy cultural assets from the Islamic period.

The Western Wall Rabbi, Shmuel Rabinowitz, is a man of action: He never for a moment hid his intention of exploiting the repair of the ramp to turn the unused space below it into an extension of the women's prayer section. He would joke that the Lord had answered his prayers by putting cracks in the ramp, which would make it possible to reduce the crowding at the Western Wall Plaza. The rabbi also used his connections in earthly Jerusalem - namely, in the office of then prime minister Ehud Olmert.

Together with the Company for the Reconstruction and Development of the Jewish Quarter, Rabinowitz promoted a detailed plan for changing the face of the Mughrabi ramp. And Olmert even put himself at the head of a special ministerial committee for advancing the project. The plan went from one planning committee to another until it reached the National Planning and Building Committee.

But two weeks ago, something happened in Jerusalem that threatens to spoil the plan. The president of the Jerusalem District Court, Judge Moussia Arad, took a look at the pictures shown her by attorney Kais Nasser, who is representing Islamic historian Dr. Mahmoud Massalha in his petition against the plan. She looked, and it apparently had an effect.

According to the pictures, which were taken in 2004, the damage to the ramp is small and concentrated mainly in its northern section. An expert opinion accompanying the photographs stated that the cracks did not affect the other parts of the ramp at all, so it is possible to renovate it quickly, at a cost of no more than NIS 50,000.

Arad ordered representatives of the Prime Minister's Office to get back to her within a month about whether their boss would accept her proposal to shelve the project for expanding the women's prayer section. Meanwhile, Nasser will obtain UNESCO's opinion of the plan. The United Nations organization has been monitoring the project from its inception to ensure that the work does no harm to the site.

But Nasser's joy is mixed with skepticism. "We have proved that the fall of a few stones was exploited in order to change the appearance of a site of unparalleled sensitivity and explosiveness," the Jerusalem attorney said Monday. But he quickly added: "Unfortunately, in view of the opposition of the Western Wall lobby and its great influence, I find it difficult to believe the state will accept the court's proposal."

So what if the Turks are angry? Their ambassador has not sat on a sofa opposite Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon for a long time.

The shallow Left

Defense Minister Ehud Barak has nicknamed the Israeli Left the "Deep Left," turning this depleted camp into a strike force that threatens the peace initiative of his friend, Benjamin Netanyahu. In a new book published by Am Oved, "Malkodet Hakav Hayarok" ("The Green Line Trap"), Prof. Yehouda Shenhav joins in dancing on the grave of the Zionist Left that supports a two-state solution based on the 1967 borders.

The Tel Aviv University sociologist, one of the leaders of the Mizrahi Democratic Rainbow Coalition, puts the word "Left" in quotes and claims that it formulates its perception of the conflict out of a cultural, economic and political worldview that is essentially sectorial and conservative. In his eyes, the 1967 paradigm is the main consciousness barrier Israelis face in addressing the conflict, and he prophesies that it will collapse in favor of the 1948 paradigm.

In Shenhav's view, the liberal Left focuses on the war against the settlements in order to preserve Israel within the Green Line, and in this way sentences the refugee issue to oblivion. The return of tens of thousands of settlers to within the Green Line is, in his opinion, a fantasy of the liberal Left, which does not deal at all with the morality of such an evacuation. And as if that were not enough, he adds: "The 'moderate Left' participated actively in normalizing the moral injustices that Green-Line Israel created." Shenhav claims that the mental terror created by the demographic discourse does violence to the Palestinians and, no less so, to the Jews.

Shenhav says he does not deny the right of the Jews, as a national collective, to self-determination. But at the same time, he proposes a model that will include the return of any Palestinian refugees that so desire, so as to realize the legitimate rights of both nations in the space they share.

After being attacked by Barak from the right and by philosophers such as Shenhav from the left, it is not surprising that the peace camp is in trouble.

Source:http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1146940.html

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World's tallest building Burj Dubai opens to public

4 Jan 2010, 2155 hrs IST, PTI

DUBAI: Blazing fireworks and dazzling lights marked the opening of the world's tallest tower, Burj Dubai, which the Gulf Emirates hopes will pep up its international image, shaken by debt woes.

Dubai World Implications - How the Dubai debt crisis is impacting the U.S. economy. New Rpt : www.WealthDaily.com/

Burj Dubai opens to public

Dubai's breif history of mega projects

Full coverage: Dubai debt crisis

The $1.5 billion structure, an "unprecedented" engineering marvel that was thrown open to the public today, was built with a major contribution from India, a vast labour force.

The steel and glass tower was opened by Dubai's ruler Sheikh Mohammad Bin Rashid al Maktoum, who also lifted the veil on a closely guarded secret of its final height.

"Emirates has made a mark on the world and Dubai has built something for the world that is built by human beings," Sheikh Mohammed said while announcing the tower open. The paratroopers then came down to greet onlookers.

The launch coincided with the fourth ascencion to the throne of Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum. The Burj Dubai Metro station also opened today to mark the launch.

Declaring that the tower is 818 metres (2,684 feet) high, he said the new building pips all its nearest rivals, including the 101-storey high Taipei Tower in Taiwan.

Sheikh Mohammad inaugurated the tower in a colourful ceremony featuring dazzling laser lights, fireworks display and a choreographed water display on the Dubai fountains which stretch for 275 metres at the foot of the tower.

The Dubai Burj's record seeking builders are also boasting of the highest occupied floor of any building in the world and today the needle-shaped tower ranks taller than north Dakota's television mast.

Source:http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/news-by-industry/et-cetera/Worlds-tallest-building-Burj-Dubai-opens-to-public/articleshow/5410809.cms

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