04/09/2023
'Petronas Towers, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia' -
The Petronas Towers are the tallest twin towers in the world. They stand 1,242 feet tall and consist of 88 floors. The sky bridge located between the 41st and 42nd floors is the highest two-story bridge in the world. Most buildings of extreme height are built with steel skeletons but the cost to import steel into Malaysia made this impractical so the towers were built from concrete (making them twice as heavy and resulting in the need for a double sized base) making them the tallest concrete structures ever built.
The towers were designed by Argentine - North American architect César Pelli. They chose a distinctive postmodern style to create a 21st-century icon for Kuala Lumpur. Planning on the Petronas Towers started on 1 January 1992 and included rigorous tests and simulations of wind and structural loads on the design. Seven years of construction followed beginning on 1 March 1993 with excavation, which involved moving 500 truckloads of earth every night to dig down 30 metres (98 ft) below the surface. The total cost was $1.6 billion upon completion.
