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Raffles City Chongqing is located at the very heart of the city, facing the junction of the Yangtze River and Jialing River. This strategic location attaches a great deal of symbolic significance to the super-scale development—as an icon of booming Chongqing.
The design was inspired by the historic images of great Chinese sailing vessels on the river, paying tribute to Chongqing’s noble past as a trading centre. This mixed-use development will consist of a shopping mall and eight towers for residential, office, serviced residence and hotel use, yielding a total GFA exceeding 1,127,000m². The complex will also serve as an important transportation hub integrating bus terminal, subway station and ferry terminal.
Arup is providing structural engineering services for all design stages for this largest ever Raffles City development in the world.
Project Summary
350m Two central towers, offering offices, serviced apartments and hotel facilities
9.4This slenderness ratio which poses challenges and requires innovative and effective structural solutions
10thRaffles City development in World and is largest of them all
The complex has an ambitious structure with eight towers gently arcing toward the water, forming the ‘apex’ to the city’s peninsula—like the great masts of a ship with its sail pulling the city forward.
The two central 350m towers, accommodating offices, serviced apartments and hotel facilities, boast a slenderness ratio over 9.4. This poses great challenges to our structural engineers, and requires innovative and effective structural solutions.
We adopted four mega corner columns connected to the central core wall via diagonal outriggers and belt trusses, forming an effective mega frame structural system.
To realise the high curvatures along building height for the four residential towers, we used the curving perimeter columns which are tied up with belt trusses to provide the lateral stability. The four buildings will be capped by a conservatory, providing various amenities, green spaces and 360 degree views of the city.
Upon completion the development will serve as a symbol for Chongqing’s thriving present and future.
