Plans for a mile high skyscraper in Tokyo could be twice as tall as the current tallest building in the world, Dubai's Burj Khalifa. This super-tall building is set to reach a height of 5,577ft and host up to 55,000 people in Tokyo bay, an inlet southeast of the Japanese capital. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...ice-as-tall-as-the-burj-khalifa-a6858061.html How's your morning commute? Well, 5 miles to work and 1 mile to my cubicle.
I wonder how it will perform in large earthquakes, which are relatively frequent in Japan. From what you wrote, it sounds like it's going to be built on landfill of some sort, which would probably be subject to liquefaction. In strong earthquakes, ground water is often forced up into soft soils, driving soil grains apart, causing the soil to suddenly take on a consistency like jello which magnifies the earth's shaking at the surface and leaves the soil no longer able to bear loads. This is especially common (and dangerous) in loosely compacted landfills next to large bodies of water (like Tokyo bay). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soil_liquefaction Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! This mile-high mega-tower is going to have to be built on very robust piles, all the way down to bedrock. If Tokyo gets a magnitude 8, like Japan saw in Fukishima, and if this mile-high building's foundations become unstable, then it could topple over with 55,000 people inside it.
I'm sure you are right that it will be anchored in rock. Regarding the shaking during a tremor, I imagine that if the centre of gravity of the building is far from the ground, the design may be to enable the base to move while the upper part remains relatively still. The Japanese have quite a bit of experience of this sort of thing. Personally I'd be more worried about how you get out in case of fire. I assume there must be some sort of "fireproof" lift shaft arrangement, but how fireproof is "fireproof"?
