Today's Podcast is sponsored by elevatorbooks.com
KONE is the latest OEM to win significant work providing the 28.5-km-long Wuxi Metro Line 3 in China with vertical-transportation equipment. Following a previous order to supply Wuxi Metro Line 2, this order consists of 99 TransitMasterTM and 140 heavy-duty escalators. Designed to meet the special requirements of Chinese metro projects, the escalators have a maximum transport capacity of 7,300 people per hour. Trial operations are expected to start in mid 2020. The main developer is Wuxi Metro Group Co. Ltd., and the architect is Guangzhou Metro Design & Research Institute Co. Ltd.
Developer Living in Interiors wants to build Nile Tower, a 70-story structure in Cairo designed by the late Zaha Hadid that would be the tallest in Africa and, ideally, signify the resurgence of Egypt as a great place to invest, Forbes reports. Despite a weakening Egyptian pound driving up the cost of construction, the developer is breaking ground because it believes "the construction sector is crucial to driving growth in the domestic economy and is key to the government's plan for successful reforms." Part of a larger plan to transform the area between downtown Cairo and the Nile into an upscale area, the structure would twist from a narrow base to a rectangular skyscraper that contains apartments on the top 36 floors, a hotel on the middle 18 floors and amenities and entertainment options below.
Excavation is in "full swing" for Tishman Speyer's The Spiral designed by Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) in the Hudson Yards district, New York YIMBY reports. Expected to be complete by 2022, the 64-story supertall at 509 West 34th Street has a design that "ensures that every floor opens to the outdoors, creating hanging gardens and cascading atria that connect the open floorplates from the ground floor to the summit into a single uninterrupted workspace," BIG head architect Bjarke Ingels said. When it tops out at 1,031 ft., The Spiral will become the area's fifth supertall. Pfizer has signed a lease for 800,000 sq. ft. over 18 floors.
Advisories in English and Hindi on proper use of escalators are to be posted near escalators at India’s Northern Railways Chandigarh Station in the wake of an accident on August 27 in which a two-year-old girl, who was barefoot, "severely injured" her foot on one of the units, The Times of India reports. An investigation found there was no fault in the Platform 1 escalator and that a properly installed skirt safety was in place. The child's mother said she was carrying luggage in one hand and holding the child in another when the toddler fell with such force that her foot became trapped between the sidewall and the steps. Northern Railways is also considering posting attendants at busy embarkation and debarkation points to assist passengers who are illiterate.
Frechen, Germany-based DigiPara AG will be presenting "From R&D to BIM," covering building information modeling (BIM) in elevator construction, at E2 Forum Frankfurt, a new "Innovation Forum for Elevator and Escalator Technology” taking place on September 18-19 at Messe Frankfurt in Frankfurt, Germany. DigiPara CEO Andreas Fleischmann will explain how to reach optimal R&D BIM workflow in the elevator industry, including typical BIM processes and how engineering to order will be in the future, using the company’s DigiPara Liftdesigner software. The 2018 version of the product can draw automation through enterprise-resource-planning systems, and load and reuse computer-aided-design (CAD) models from common CAD programs and export it as 3D BIM models. Other aspects of the presentation include how to load any 3D content into an elevator BIM model within Liftdesigner and how to work with different levels of development.
Read more at elevatorworld.com/news
Image: Living In Interiors | Forbes
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