Tag: arcology

Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid: 14 Times Taller Than the Great Pyramid
Planned for Tokyo Bay, Japan, the Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid is a massive metropolis in the form of a gigantic pyramid. The Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid is 6,575 feet (2,004 meters) tall, or roughly 14 times as high as the Great Pyramid of Giza. If constructed, it would unquestionably stand as the tallest man-made monument in history. This proposed hyperbuilding can accommodate between 750,000 to 1,000,000 people at once.
The building was designed in 2004 by the Italian architect Dante Bini, and David Dimitric from the Shimizu Corporation of Tokyo. The Shimizu Construction Corporation is planning to start constructing the Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid in 2030.
If built, Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid would appear like this. (Rendering: NeoMan Studios).
The Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid is a bold new engineering proposal that represents a radical new approach to urban life. It would be one of the most difficult engineering projects in history, and the results would completely alter Tokyo Bay.
It may have some reminiscences of ancient constructions, but this pyramid is really special. The population of San Francisco is compressed onto an artificial island in Tokyo Bay, along with 24 buildings with an average height of 80 stories. It’s like a city inside a city; it has everything it needs.
The Design of the Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid
The components of the Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid.
With its 3.1 square miles (8 km²) of base area, a total of 275 city blocks’ worth of land would be consumed by its footprint. The Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid has many layers of hollow trusses in the shape of a diamond or the Great Pyramid of Giza.
This mega city pyramid is the first offshore city ever proposed. Also known as TRY 2004, the structure stands at almost 6,600 feet above sea level. Its foundation will consist of 36 piers made from exceptional concrete and they will be the biggest underwater footings ever created.
The body of this mind-bending mega pyramid will be constructed from 204 individual pyramid pieces and have a total surface area of about 34 square miles (88 km²).
These fundamental pyramidal construction units are 1,150 feet (350 m) long on each side. Each unit is wide enough to enclose a 100-story office building.
The towering apartment complexes.
Structures on both sides of the city’s fundamental construction units keep its office towers, residential buildings, and other complexes afloat. Because of the facilities’ flexible structural layout, huge foundations aren’t necessary.
At 6,575 feet (2,004 m), the monument will be 14 times taller than the Great Pyramid of Giza which is 456 feet (139 m) tall. In all, the glass city will be made up of 55 individual pyramids, each around the size of the Great Pyramid in Egypt.
The base of the mega building covers an area of 1,980 acres (800 ha). And the Great Giza Pyramid covers a base area of 13 acres (5.3 ha). This makes the Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid around 150 times larger than the Giza Pyramid.
Shaft construction system.
The large support shafts, some 33 feet (10 m) in diameter, others 52 feet (16 m), and both 1150 feet (350 m) in length, will house the city’s infrastructure. They will include electrical and plumbing networks, transit systems, and observation windows. The connecting nodes will function as transit hubs.
They will be coated with a crystalline glass sphere to allow sunlight to permeate the whole metropolis through fiber optic cables. Standardized materials and components, as well as robotic self-assembling and pushing-up systems, will streamline the building process.
Living Inside the Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid
One of the mega pyramid’s many nodes and tubes.
Faster walkways, slanted elevators, and a private high-speed transport system made up of self-driving compartments going inside the framework will make up the method of getting about this massive structure. To do this, the robotic pods will move about within the trusses. The residents will be traveling across these large grids of hollow supports.
Connecting them is a network of 86 miles of horizontal and diagonal aerial tunnels and 55 nodes between them. This design allows to fit a subway system the size of San Francisco’s into an area barely one-fifth as big.
At least 24 structures, each with 80 floors, will serve as residential and commercial spaces. They will be suspended like fruits from the pyramid’s upper and lower levels by nanotube cables. The building uses solar panels mounted on the trusses to convert sunlight into electricity. Algae and the power of waves hitting the structure will be the additional sources of energy.
Tubes, nodes, and hanging skyscrapers.
The area this hyper pyramid would cover if you placed it over New York City includes Brooklyn, Queens, Manhattan, and New Jersey. The pyramid will be constructed of steel tubes and glass by robots while using solar and wind energy to regulate the temperature inside. Huge steel and ceramic composite pillars will stand horizontally and diagonally to support this city of glass.
Infrastructure such as heating, ventilation, air conditioning, electrical, communication, plumbing, and lifts will all be maintained by these pillars. And the crystal spheres measuring 164 feet (50 m) in diameter will contain their intersection points. Those spheres will concentrate sunlight and distribute it through optical fibers to the rest of the city.
Elevators installed in diagonal shafts will allow residents and visitors to the city to travel between floors vertically. The horizontal shafts will house a linear-motor transit system that the residents will employ to go laterally. People will utilize moving walkways, escalators, or corridors to go from a node to a building.
Indoors, people will take the lifts. For vertical movement, the city’s developed distribution system will use a continuous circulatory transport system. When a package reaches a node, the automatic transfer loader will put it on a container carriage or conveyor belt for horizontally-automated distribution.
The Octahedral Building Units
The TRY 2004 is an innovative building with octahedral modules that are 1,150 feet (350 m) on one side. These modular units can be expanded vertically or laterally to meet changing demands.
This is because they are built by uniting two pyramids at their bases. Each module can sustain an integrated structure on all sides. This is while still reducing wind load thanks to its wind-permeable construction.
The flexible octahedral units are one of the fundamental construction units of the mega pyramid.
When it comes to its aerial structures, the TRY 2004 minimizes vibrations and distortions by strategically installing vibration-control devices at key locations. The structural integrity of commercial and residential structures, as well as ancillary amenities, is ensured by this three-dimensional layout.
With its glass exterior, natural light floods the rooms of the transparent pyramid. Also, the thin pipes utilized in the three-dimensional trusses allow sunlight to penetrate deeply into the infrastructure, making for a useful and visually beautiful setting.
Inspired by the 1982 Blade Runner Movie
The pyramidal headquarters of the fictitious Tyrell Corporation, seen in the 1982 film Blade Runner served as inspiration for the Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid’s futuristic architecture. One of the engineers at the Shimizu Company got the concept for the Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid after seeing the movie in 1982.
In the 1982 movie “Blade Runner,” the headquarters of the made-up Tyrell Corporation are shown to be shaped like a pyramid.
The design was copyrighted by the company in October 1992. And unlike other visionary hyperbuildings, it is still an officially ongoing project. Also, Kenneth William Gatland and David Jeffries’ Future Cities: Homes and Living into the 21st Century, published in 1979, proposes a comparable gigantic floating metropolis in the form of a pyramid.
The Purpose of the Shimizu Pyramid
Just like the Ultima Tower, X-Seed 4000, or Tokyo Tower of Babel the Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid is an arcology (“architecture” and “ecology”) project rather than solely an architecture project. Right now, 14 million people in Tokyo are squeezed between Mount Fuji and the Pacific.
But this supercity could house one-fourteenth of Tokyo’s population. It would contribute to the shortage of housing space in Tokyo. Similar to other visionary mega towers, it’s a solution to both population growth and environmental destruction.
The Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid’s artwork.
There will be offices, residences, research facilities, an underground transport system, and resorts in this mega building. Buildings of various types (homes, offices, etc.) will be found in the first 1–4 layers. And layers 5–8 are where people will find the majority of the research institutions, recreational facilities, hotels, etc.
Each layer will be 820 feet (250 m) in height. There will be 240,000 homes inside the structure and 5,930 acres (2,400 ha) of space will be dedicated to office use.
Of its total 22,000 acres, more than 12,000 will be used for homes, 6,000 for businesses, and 4,000 for amenities like parks and schools. Separate power plants will be installed for each structure.
Small businesses and homes alike will be constructed in pyramidal shapes using 400 square foot (37 m²) modules that can be stacked in any configuration to create larger buildings.
The world population is increasing by 1% on average every year. The hypothetical “hyperbuildings” like the Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid suggest verticalizing highly populated urban areas to solve the overpopulation problem. Urban planners are looking for ways to reduce the heat island effect in densely populated areas for future generations.
Hotter cities and other environmental issues are to blame for this phenomenon. The Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid makes it possible to construct a massive city without negatively impacting the surrounding environment.
The Construction of the Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid
The illustration of the Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid.
But the Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid is too heavy to be constructed with currently available technology and resources (steel, concrete, etc.). Because a single 80-story skyscraper made of steel and glass alone weighs 365,000 tons.
According to estimates, the Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid will weigh approximately 1,800,000,000 tons. Therefore, each of the 36 foundations would need to be able to sustain 50 million tons. This is more than 50 times the weight of the Golden Gate Bridge.
In order to build the huge structure and prevent its inevitable collapse due to its own weight, what is required is a new type of ultra-lightweight and strong carbon nanotube and graphene material.
This material is much lighter than steel while still being thousands of times stronger. For the same reason, the Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid has to be built on water due to the lack of land suitable for this pyramid.
The Shimizu Megacity Pyramid’s exterior is made up of massive hollow trusses constructed of carbon nanotubes. These carbon nanotubes reduce the weight of the building by 100 times and last nearly forever, even outlasting the Egyptian pyramids.
Since these mega trusses are flexible, they allow powerful typhoons with winds of 130 mph, devastating earthquakes, and tsunamis to pass through them. This is necessary since the Japanese archipelago is intersected by an active fault in the Pacific Rim subduction zone (the Pacific Ring of Fire).
The materials are currently the subject of intense study, and the construction of the building is still scheduled to begin in 2030. However, as of yet, little real progress has been made.
Founded in 1804, the Shimizu Construction Corporation is still leading the effort to complete the construction of the biggest man-made structure ever by the year 2110. The Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid will be built and maintained with the help of robots.
The Cost of Building the Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid
The cost of building the Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid is expected to run around $600 billion or €560 billion. It is one of the relatively cheaper visionary projects to build. For comparison, the X-Seed 4000 costs $1.3 trillion, the Tokyo Tower of Babel costs $25 trillion, and the Ultima Tower costs approximately $210 billion to build.
References
The Guardian – Unbuilt Tokyo: ‘depthscrapers’ and a million-person pyramid
Edward Relph, “The Modern Urban Landscape.” (Book)
(2007) “Population of Tokyo” by Tokyo Metropolitan Government.
Nydailynews.com – Incredible concept designs of future cities that seem out of this world
February 18, 2023
Ultima Tower: The Tallest Building Ever Envisioned for the US
February 16, 2023

Tokyo Tower of Babel: World’s Tallest Building Ever Planned

The Tokyo Tower of Babel is a proposed hyperbuilding in the city of Tokyo that is 33,000 feet or 6,2 miles (10 km) tall. The Tokyo Tower of Babel was designed as a new megastructure by Professor Toshio Ojima of Waseda University. And it is the world’s tallest building ever envisioned by humankind. This ultra-skyscraper requires approximately 100 to 150 years to complete. But once built, it has the capacity to house 30 million people.

The name alludes to the aspiration that it ascends to the heavens like the biblical Tower of Babel, which was 8,150 ft (2,500 m) tall. If built, the Tokyo Tower of Babel would reach a height that is 3,770 feet (1,150 m) higher than Mount Everest. This makes the project an unprecedented architectural achievement.

What is the Tokyo Tower of Babel?

The 3D modeling of the Tokyo Tower of Babel. — The 3D modeling of the Tokyo Tower of Babel by MetaBallStudios (MBS).

The Tokyo Tower of Babel is an urban structure that is 33,000 feet (10,000 meters) in height. The building was proposed at the 1992 Brazil Earth Summit by the architect Toshio Ojima. At the time, it was one of many 1,000-meter-class eco-friendly ultra-high skyscrapers.

These skyscrapers were designed by major construction corporations and developers in the 1980s and early 1990s. Among them, the Tokyo Tower of Babel is the tallest visionary skyscraper ever put forward.

The closest building in height to the Tokyo Tower of Babel would be the X-Seed 4000 which is only 13,100 feet (4,000 m) tall. X-Seed 4000 has 800 floors. But, the Tokyo Tower of Babel has around 1969 floors on average.

The structure’s logarithmic design, conical shape, wide base, and narrowing top parts make it strong enough to bear any force applied to it. The Tokyo Tower of Babel is an example of arcology because the project focuses on biodiversity preservation.

Tokyo's metropolitan area begins to live in a single megastructure in the final stage of its growth, or the 8th generation. — Tokyo’s metropolitan area begins to live in a single megastructure in the final stage of its growth, or the 8th generation.

The growth of the Tokyo metropolitan area is split into eight different generations. It begins with the Edo period in 1880 and continues into the far future. In the final stage, or the 8th generation, all of the residents of the area will begin to live in a single megastructure, similar to the Tokyo Tower of Babel. This megastructure is designed to mitigate the negative environmental effects of urban growth.

In the 8th generation, this mega building or the Tokyo Tower of Babel begins housing 30 million residents. This hyperstructure is supposed to be located on the inner side of the Yamanote Line, one of Tokyo’s busiest lines that was opened in 1885. The blueprint and model of the building were based on the concept art of Masaki Yabuno.

The Purpose of the Project

Hyperbuilding projects like Japan’s Tokyo Tower of Babel propose verticalizing overpopulated metropolises. The aim is to address the issue of unorganized, flat urban buildings in Tokyo city. The megastructure brings together all of the city’s government, business, and recreation facilities into one huge building. Urban planners are working on a solution to the heat island effect of overpopulated cities for future generations. This effect is brought on by the buildup of waste heat from urban activities as well as other environmental issues. This includes vehicles’ exhaust emissions and access issues like traffic congestion.

After Japan’s economic bubble burst in 1994, the Japanese Hyper Building Study Group was formed to continue researching hyperstructures such as the Tokyo Tower of Babel. But the frequent changes in government and the frequent earthquakes were the last straw for this study group.

As a result, the Tokyo Tower of Babel was never constructed. As the Japanese economy collapsed, it seems that bold ideas like this were put on hold. Most of them failed to see the broader social and economic implications. Because they were too preoccupied with the technical possibilities of the moment. One of them was undoubtedly the Tokyo Tower of Babel.

The Tokyo Tower of Babel's height in comparison to other tallest buildings such as the Burj Khalifa or the Empire State Building. — The Tokyo Tower of Babel’s height in comparison to other tallest buildings such as the Burj Khalifa or the Empire State Building.

At a height of 33,000 feet (10,000 m), the Tokyo Tower of Babel dwarfs even the biggest structures. This includes the Burj Khalifa (2,716 ft/828 m) and Everest (29,032 ft/8,849 m). If built, it would be without question the highest structure on the planet.

For comparison, jet planes go no lower than 33,000 ft (10 km) on domestic flights and 39,000 ft (12 km) on international flights. At a height of 33,000 ft (10 km), the air pressure is one-fourth that at sea level, and the temperature is about -67 degrees Fahrenheit (-55 degrees Celsius).

The Cost of the Tokyo Tower of Babel

With a capacity of 30 million people, the Tokyo Tower of Babel is an enormous megastructure. The building’s construction cost is 25 trillion USD. It comes with a basal area of 42,5 mi² (110 km²), a total floor area of 656 mi² (1,700 km², including all levels of floors) and an impressive steel volume of 10 billion tons. This total floor area is equal to the area of the city of Houston (4,460 mi²).

According to a 2010 estimation, building the Tokyo Tower of Babel would cost 3 quadrillion yen, or 3,3 quadrillion yen in 2023. This makes around 25 trillion USD in today’s money (or 25,500,000,000,000 US dollars). The structure was expected to cost about 30 years of Japan’s national budget, or six times the country’s GDP.

This was solely because of how impractical and destructive the plan was. The megastructure was devised in the so-called booming era of the “bubble economy” in Japan, lasting from 1986 to 1991.

Tokyo Tower of Babel’s Design

Tokyo Tower of Babel sections — The six different territories of the mega tower.

The Tokyo Tower of Babel reaches all the way to 33,000 feet (10,000 m) in height. Thus, the overall design of this mega building is separated into several designations. They are divided into specific heights, and each of them provides specific functions.

Territory	Facilities	Height	Area
Geo Territory	underground infrastructure, energy plants, parking lots, and generators	Underground	–
Human Territory	residential and commercial complexes	Up to 3,300 ft (1,000 m)	250k ac (100k ha)
Cloud Territory	commercial, office, and hotel spaces	Up to 11,500 ft (3,500 m)	75k ac (30k ha)
Sky Territory	educational, administrative, and leisure facilities	Up to 19,500 ft (6,000 m)	50k ac (20k ha)
Ultimate Territory	industrial, experimental research, and base facilities	Up to 30,000 ft (9,000 m)	50k ac (20k ha)
Space Territory	solar energy collector and a space development center.	Up to 33,000 ft (10,000 m)	250k ac (100k ha)

The Challenges to the Tokyo Tower of Babel

From 1840 to 2110, Japan plans to surpass the United States in tall buildings: The Sky City 1000, X-Seed 4000, and The Tokyo Tower of Babel from right to left. — From 1840 to 2110, Japan plans to surpass the United States in tall buildings: The Sky City 1000, X-Seed 4000, and the Tokyo Tower of Babel from right to left.

The Tower of Babel is designed to be environmentally friendly and energy efficient. In theory, large swaths of the Kanto Plain, the largest plain in Japan, would be made available as a result of the construction of this hyperbuilding. However, there are a few challenges to the Tokyo Tower of Babel project:

Extreme cost

First, the task of creating a budget for the proposed construction of the Tokyo Tower of Babel is challenging. This is due to the extreme cost of the project and the need for expensive, semi-permanent repairs. Relocating the residents and businesses in the area surrounding the tower would take a significant amount of time and money.

A large plot of land

To build the Tokyo Tower of Babel, you would also need a large piece of land with a minimum size of 10.5 km. This is for a square foundation. For a circle foundation, the minimum radius would be 6 km (12 km in diameter).

Restricted flight zone

When a building’s height exceeds 3,300 feet or 1,000 meters, the airspace around it will have to be restricted. This is due to the risk of aircraft collisions caused by man-made or unexpected difficulties, such as terrorism. In order to reduce the likelihood of accidents, flying would need to be closely regulated or outright forbidden in the area of the building.

Potential death toll

There is a potential death toll from the collapse of the Tokyo Tower of Babel caused by an earthquake or other disaster. And this could be in the tens of millions, particularly in earthquake-prone areas like the Tokyo metropolitan region. To avoid the loss of many lives in the event of a structural failure, the Tokyo Tower of Babel must meet extremely stringent safety standards.

Harsh weather conditions

Moving on, the inhabitable space on the upper floors of the Tokyo Tower of Babel would have to be as airtight and heat-retaining as a jet airliner. This is to protect the people inside from the harsh weather outside, such as broken windows, strong gusts of wind, and temperatures as low as -67°F or -55°C.

FAQ About the Tokyo Tower of Babel

Will the Tokyo Tower of Babel be built?

It’s quite doubtful that the Tokyo Tower of Babel will ever be constructed in the next 100 years. But if it were, it would be the highest building in the world, making Mount Everest seem like a toy by 3,770 feet (1,150 m).

How long would it take to build the Tokyo Tower of Babel?

The construction of this ultra-skyscraper is projected to take between 100 and 150 years. But once completed, it would be large enough to house 30 million people.

How high is the Tokyo Tower of Babel?

Professor Toshio Ojima proposed the Tokyo Tower of Babel in 1992, and it stands 33,000 feet (6.2 miles) or 10,000 meters tall.

How many floors does the Tokyo Tower of Babel have?

The Tokyo Tower of Babel has around 1969 floors on average. The structure is famous for its height.

February 14, 2023

X-Seed 4000: A Man-Made Building Taller Than Mountains
What is X-Seed 4000?
The X-Seed 4000 is a tapered, pyramid-shaped megastructure with a sea-based location, inspired by Mount Fuji, designed as an artificial island with interconnected nodes, resembling a “sea mountain,” featuring an open-style steel framework, housing a variety of facilities and a microclimate support system, supported by a 2000-foot-thick steel base allowing it to float on the ocean.
X-Seed 4000 is a 13,100-foot (4,000-meter) tall megastructure with 800 floors. It has a capacity for 1 million people living inside at the same time. The X-Seed 4000 is a floating “ocean city” off the coast of Japan. It is designed as an artificial island and will be home to a million people once completed. This unfinished ultra-skyscraper project was first conceived by Taisei Corporation in 1995. With 17,300 acres (7,000 ha) of total floor area, the base floor is 21,300 feet (6,500 m) in diameter and located on the sea. The width of X-Seed 4000 gradually narrows as it rises. The skyscraper takes on the shape of Mount Fuji, Japan’s highest mountain at 12,388 feet (3,776 m). Each of the 30 floors of X-Seed 4000 is completed every 330 feet (100 meters).
The Cost of X-Seed 4000
X-Seed 4000 stands in Tokyo city as envisioned by the Taisei Corporation.
Projects like X-Seed immediately conjure up images of Earth’s inevitable transformation into an ecumenopolis or multicultural metropolis. This is similar to Coruscant from Star Wars.
The building’s most distinctive characteristics are its sea-based location and its form which was inspired by Japan’s iconic Mount Fuji. It has the form of a pyramid, with several nodes connected by long, snaking tubes. Each node is like a miniature city. There are enough facilities inside—including a gym, a supermarket, and a garden—that its residents wouldn’t need to leave the building.
More than three million tons of steel would go into making this superstructure. Thus, the construction of X-Seed 4000 was expected to take 30 years and cost 170 trillion yen, or 1.3 trillion USD. As the first man-made mountain ever envisioned, the cost of building X-Seed 4000 would be more than the yearly budget of several nations. But the price tag might vary. It amounted to around $900,000,000,000 in 2006 dollars and approximately $1,000,000,000,000 in 2016 dollars. In 2023, the X-Seed 4000 would cost 1,300,000,000,000 USD in today’s money.
X-Seed 4000’s Design
X-Seed 4000 is next to the tallest buildings ever planned, the Tokyo Tower of Babel, as well as the Ultima Tower of San Francisco.
If built, the X-Seed 4000, with a height of 13,100 feet (4,000 meters), would be the second-tallest man-made structure ever proposed. It would be behind the enormous Tokyo Tower of Babel (6.2 mi or 10 km high). Because of its current elevation, the building is almost halfway up Everest (29.030 ft or 8.849 m high).
As a visionary project, X-Seed 4000 is an example of arcology because of its focus on preserving biodiversity. With its tapered logarithmic structure, cone shape, large base, and gradually narrowing upper sections, the structure is well-equipped to withstand any force applied to it and not collapse.
Because of its elevation, its summit would always be blanketed in snow, making it ideal for use as both a ski area and a weather observatory. There would be a university among other amenities like parks, hospitals, and marinas. This is because the city is being constructed on an artificial island. The project is intended to solve Tokyo’s overpopulation and environmental problems. That is why it is more than just a simple skyscraper.
This is what the interior of the X-Seed 4000 would look like.
X-Seed 4000’s Construction Site
The imagination of the planners is unbounded. Often, new ideas are formulated that seem to be straight out of science fiction. But in fact, they are the result of extensive research and careful calculation. However, only a small fraction of these proposals will be workable, at least in the next 30 years.
The design of the X-Seed 4000 is based on Peter Neville’s ideas. However, since this construction is notoriously challenging, no viable options for the project have been explored until now. Due to the project’s massive magnitude, the construction location chosen for X-Seed 4000 is to be on Tokyo Bay and on water. The supertall skyscraper would cover 26 square miles (26 km²) of land at its foundation in Tokyo Bay. This makes around 750,000,000 square feet of living and working space.
Yes, X-Seed 4000 is a “sea mountain.” Because the only practical site to construct such a massive structure is on the water due to the lack of land suitable for the task.
The Features of X-Seed 4000
The 4000-meter, or 2.5-mile, steel mountain is supported by a 2000-foot-thick (600 m) steel base, allowing X-Seed 4000 to float on the ocean. A large number of separate “building cells” are housed in the open-style steel framework. Steel legs hold walkway connections. Massive magnetic elevators can carry as many as 200 passengers through the steel arms at once. Skiing is always possible all year at the top of the building, and it takes around 30 minutes to reach the top of the building thanks to Maglevs (magnetically levitated speed trains).
The X-Seed 4000’s first blueprints were drawn up back in 1980. However, no one had ever really thought seriously about building it. Constructed in the form of a mountain, the skyscraper is a state-of-the-art structure that blends cutting-edge technology with an eco-friendly design. If X-Seed 4000 were to be built, it would be taller than many tall mountains in the world. In fact, it would be almost 738 ft (225 m) higher than Mount Fuji, the highest mountain in Japan, and the seventh-highest peak of an island on Earth.
Internally, an electromagnetic train system transports both people and cargo across the complex. Unlike other skyscrapers, the X-Seed 4000, with its towering height, must protect its occupants not just from the forces of gravity but also from the changing temperature outside. Ecological comfort is ensured by the presence of environmental controls in the building.
The blueprint of the structure includes the use of solar power for heating and cooling purposes. In X-Seed 4000, photovoltaic energy controls light, temperature, air pressure, etc. to power the whole microclimate support system.
Given its location in the Asia-Pacific volcanic region, the X-Seed 4000 must be resilient enough to weather tsunamis and earthquakes. This is a region called the Pacific Ring of Fire, the world’s strongest volcanic activity zone. The same threats will also be experienced by the Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid. The structure’s enormous height makes it ideal for shielding its residents directly from severe air pressure differences and extreme climatic shifts, unlike “regular” skyscrapers.
The Purpose of X-Seed 4000
X-Seed 4000 next to skyscrapers for comparison.

There have been rumors that the Japanese were about to start building the X-Seed 4000 skyscraper some time ago. But this does not appear to be the case anymore. Georges Binder, general director of Buildings & Data, a company that maintains information on buildings throughout the globe, claims that the X-Seed 4000 will “never be built.” According to Binder, the purpose of this plan was to build a reputation for the company, and it worked.
In 2007, when the Sears Tower and the Taipei 101 were fiercely competing to be named the world’s tallest building, rumors began circulating that Taisei was planning to construct X-Seed. In theory, it could surpass the current tallest building in the world, the Burj Dubai, with 828 meters (2,716 feet) in height. Even though it seemed like the project wouldn’t get off the ground, the building has become something of a legend in recent years.
Shohei Ogawa, manager of Taisei’s worldwide division’s planning department, says that the company currently has no plans for the X-Seed 4000. The whole project was the company’s fantasy proposal for the kinds of technical progress they envisioned for the future.
Is X-Seed 4000 Possible to Build?
X-Seed 4000 compared to Everest.
The X-Seed 4000 was inspired by a 1966–1967 proposal by V.I. Travush and also by M.V. Nikitin at the request of a Japanese firm. M.V. Nikitin was the primary designer of the Ostankino TV tower in Russia. But it was later decided to put an end to the project indefinitely. Today, the X-Seed 4000 is recognized in large part because the project’s blueprints were actually finalized by the construction firm. As such, it is a structure that could have been erected had full construction plans been developed utilizing the technologies available at the time.
While it may seem impossible to build X-Seed 4000 now, the goals are actually within reach. Because almost any building project with any span or height is feasible to build from a technical perspective. The electromagnetic trains, or Maglevs, could make such a big building easy to navigate around and eliminate the time people wait for an elevator to reach the 800th floor. However, the project may still not be practical in reality.
The Challenges to Building X-Seed 4000
Height comparison between the Burj Dubai (the tallest skyscraper at 828 m or 2716 ft) and the X-Seed 4000.
Financing a project that may cost over a trillion dollars is challenging. This includes acquiring the required permissions to erect the structure. Because no citizen would want a 2.5-mile-high skyscraper next to them. A two-mile-high skyscraper will already cause a downdraft at its base and throw lengthy shadows on citizens, almost darkening the streets permanently.
Elevators, water systems, and fire safety equipment may be particularly challenging to install in a skyscraper that would be almost five times higher than the current highest building in the world. For starters, the sky-high expenses of building and maintaining such a large skyscraper that costs trillions would make it unaffordable for the vast majority of people.
Intensifying the building’s population might help lessen the financial pressure. The costs would be more fairly divided if 100 million people lived there instead of 1 million.
X-Seed 4000’s height compared to other tall buildings.
Building X-Seed 4000 as envisioned is impractical due to the project’s scale. Not only are the production costs too high, but there are also collateral issues with real experimentation and the verification of natural accidental loads.
At such an extreme height, this includes structural oscillations caused by wind and a different atmospheric pressure. Let’s not forget the reactions of those who will live in the building and the implications for them. Those factors make the project problematic.
It’s not clear how many engineers will be needed and how they will be managed to build such a structure. Since Japan’s population is forecast to decrease by the year 2050, the megastructure, which was built to accommodate a rapid population increase, is becoming more irrelevant. It’s quite unlikely that the X-Seed 4000 project will ever go forward.
X-Seed 4000 and the city of Tokyo under the clouds.
The World Financial Center (2008) in Shanghai, designed by Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates, is an excellent illustration for building tall structures. The shape of this building is like a blade with a huge porthole at the top. It is designed specifically according to the characteristics of the most frequent winds in the area to limit the impact of these gusts on the skyscraper and the people who work inside it.
The Tallest Man-Made Structures Ever Planned
San Francisco’s 3,218-meter (10,558-foot) Ultima Tower, Dubai’s 2,400-meter (7,900-foot) City Tower, Japan’s 2,004-meter (6,575-foot) Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid, and either Hong Kong’s or Shanghai’s 1,228-meter (4,029-foot) Bionic Tower is one of the five tallest man-made structures, along with Tokyo’s 13,100-foot (4,000-meter) X Seed 4000, ever planned in the history of mankind.
FAQ About the X-Seed 4000
When is the X-Seed 4000 going to be built?
The precise answer is unknown, but a project like the X-Seed 4000 is unlikely to be built within the next 50 years.
Who designed the X-Seed 4000?
The design of the X-Seed 4000 is based on Peter Neville’s ideas. This unfinished ultra-skyscraper project was planned by Taisei Corporation in 1995.
What is the X-Seed 4000?
X-Seed 4000 is an ocean city that is 13,100 feet (4,000 meters) tall with 800 floors and a capacity of 1 million citizens. The building was intended to solve Tokyo’s overpopulation problems.
References
Taisei Corporation’s Official Webpage Regarding X-Seed 4000.
Michael Anissimov (2006). “Accelerating Future » X-Seed 4000”. Archived.
Ernest Burden, Visionary Architecture: Unbuilt Works of the Imagination. Amazon.
February 13, 2023