Week 3: Day 4

Wednesday June 2, 2010

Team 1: Rolex Tower

This high-rise tower is a mixed use building consisting of luxury condominiums, office and retail space with a separate parking structure. A two-level bridge connects the car park building to the first floor of the tower. The main tower consists of office floors from the first to the 31rst floor, residential apartments from the 34^th to the 56^th floor, two penthouses on the 59^th and 60^th floor and mechanical floors on levels 32, 33, 61 and 62. 
 It comprises ten elevators:

·        Six elevators stop at the 31st floor and are intended for the offices use only

·        Three elevators are intended for the residential part of the tower.

·        One service lift

The Rolex tower has also two entrances, the offices entrance and the residential entrance. The offices entrance is 10.5m high, it is tiled with marble and matrix stone and is closed by glass panels. The residential tower has an 8.5 m high entrance. 

After this general introduction about the building we went up to the office floors. Those are equipped with a raised-flooring system which allows for future versatility since none of the clients have decided on the final layout yet. But some elements, mostly exterior, are imposed on the client for aesthetic purposes of the tower.

Then we went up to the mechanical floor where the transfer beam is located due to the change in the layout of columns. We learned that most mechanical equipment is raised on springs in order to minimize the vibrations. And due to the high loads imposed by the mechanical equipment, the mechanical floor slab is cast in situ because a better compressive strength of the concrete can be achieved this way (10KN/m²). The waterproofing on those floors is also worthy of note. It is done using two levels of protection: the first is the traditional waterproofing membrane used with the polythene sheet and the second is an additional gel coat.

Afterwards we visited the apartment floors. Each floor comprises four apartments: 2 two-bedroom apartments and 2 three-bedroom apartments.

As it ascends the building opacity changes gradually from translucent to transparent.The vertical light well located at the upper portion of the residential tier forms a visual link between the walls of the tower.

Finally we visited the penthouses. The one on the 59^th floor has a swimming pool and is partitioned using rotating wooden panels along with other luxurious finishes. The second penthouse covers a larger surface area because the light well is closed at this level. The finishes on the second penthouse ranging from black mosaic tiles, polished painted timber to leather are all polished which gives a shiny appearance to the whole apartment.

Team 2: Ariyana (2Y) Tower

We visited the Ariyana Tower which is located on the 2Y plot near the Dubai Marina; it consists of three (3) basements, one (1) ground floor and thirty three (33) floors (3B+G+33). It is a residential tower that will also have retail centers on the bottom floors. The building has a built up area of 44,000 sq.m and a plot size of approximately 3100 sq.m.  Mr. Mazen Hallak, project manager (PM) gave us a tour throughout the building explaining the different finishes and the key elements that make up this structure. He also took us through the mock-up apartments that were on the 4^th floor and showed us the two (2) & three (3) bedroom apartments. We were also given a set of plans in order to relate what we saw on site to the drawings, this helped us visualize the different lines on the plans to what is actually built. We were also accompanied by the general foreman, Master G, and the quality assurance/quality control engineer to the parking levels. DCC’s parking floors are standard unless the client desires to have it otherwise. We also got stuck in the elevator for about 5 minutes with Master G and the elevator operator. Overall the Ariyana Tower is a wonderful structure with stunning views, city and marina. 

In the afternoon, there was a lecture on Disputes, Delays and Arbitration by Mr. Ian Harper. For more information on the lecture, click on the link below.

Disputes, Delays, and Arbitration Lecture