2012-02-29

Skyscrapers Curse — Continued

If you don't know about the Skyscrapers Curse, please read the previous posts I've written on the topic. Beyond that, I don't much more to add than the fact China and world are set for a major economic collapse of historical proportions.

Let's start with China:
Feb. 28 (Bloomberg) -- Shanghai Greenland Group said it may add more floors to China’s second-tallest building under construction to turn it into the highest in the world after the Burj Khalifa in Dubai. 
The closely held company set up in 1992 may increase the height of Greenland Center in the central city of Wuhan to 636 meters (2,086-foot) from 606 meters, said Wang Xiaodong, Greenland’s Shanghai-based spokesman. That will exceed the 632- meter Shanghai Tower also scheduled to be completed in 2014. 
China is home to 53 percent of all skyscrapers being built around the world, up from 44 percent a year earlier, Barclays Capital Research said. The country will increase the number of skyscrapers to 141, from the current 75, by 2017, according to the bank’s annual Skyscraper Index report in January. 
“The local government in Wuhan actually has a stronger intention to revise the plan, but it’s not easy for a skyscraper like this,” Wang said in a phone interview today, adding that the plan may be finalized by the end of the year. 
The Greenland Center broke ground on the project in December 2010 with a planned investment of 30 billion yuan ($4.8 billion). The development will include luxury hotels, apartments, and a conference center, it said. The building is on track to be completed in two years, Wang said, declining to say how much costs will be added with any revision to the plans. 
And then Vietnam:
Vietnam’s Skyscraper Keangnam to Drive Hanoi Rents to 5-Year Low
Feb. 28 (Bloomberg) -- Vietnam’s Keangnam Hanoi Landmark Tower, the tallest in Southeast Asia after Petronas Towers, is boosting prime office space in the capital Hanoi by half and threatening to drive rents to a five-year low
The property, which includes a hotel, luxury apartments and mall, is adding 100,000 square meters (1.1 million square feet) of office space, said Choi Yong-Ho, marketing manager of Keangnam Vina, the unit of South Korea’s Keangnam Enterprises Ltd. that built the 346 meters (1,135 feet) tower. 
[...]“The tower flooded the market with a lot of supply,” Fraser Wilson, Ho Chi Minh City-based director of Vietnam Property Fund at Dragon Capital, the biggest private investor in Vietnam’s stock market, said in an interview on Feb. 24. “That can only have a negative impact on the rents.” 
[...] The tower has the same height as the Center in Hong Kong and is higher than Shanghai’s Shimao International Plaza and John Hancock Center in Chicago, according to Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat’s data. 

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