{"text":[[{"start":4.96,"text":"Tall buildings win bragging rights. But decades of skyscraper inflation mean that, today, those who want to stand out from the thicket are setting their sights sideways rather than upwards."}],[{"start":16.16,"text":"So-called groundscrapers, which tend to be longer than they are tall, have been popping up in the busiest cities: look at Google’s London HQ in King’s Cross, longer than the Shard skyscraper is tall. Hong Kong, home to more skyscrapers relative to its population than almost anywhere else, will next year complete the first phase of its maiden groundscraper on the harbour front. With a gross floor area of 1.6mn sq ft, Central Yards will match the vertiginous nearby IFC 1 office block and mall combined."}],[{"start":null,"text":"
"}],[{"start":47.36,"text":"For the most part, developers do not have the choice of whether to build up or out: some central areas will lack sufficiently big plots of land, while others will not permit high-rises. But the economics of each, as well as their impact on the skyline, are very different."}],[{"start":63.36,"text":"Skyscrapers come with cons: build costs would tend to be higher given the need for additional steel underpinnings and braces. The Shard, for instance, cost some £320 per sq ft to build, Lex calculates, equivalent to perhaps £500 per sq foot today. Jason Phelps of the University of the Built Environment suggests development costs for a two-storey building might be close to £340 per sq foot."}],[{"start":88.16,"text":"But that differential needs to be set against the lower land acquisition costs associated with high-rises. If the cost of building a skyscraper represents 45 per cent of its value and land 15 per cent, buying the land for a theoretical new Shard would cost £230mn, or £180 per square foot. Should a Google-like structure with double the footprint be built in its place, that would rise to well over £400."}],[{"start":114,"text":"Despite that, the groundscraper might just be the design of the future. Risk management is one reason. Skyscrapers are big, fixed investments that are hard to repurpose: think of the skeleton steel structures that blanketed China during its property boom, which has since turned into a bust. Groundscrapers can be built and financed in sections. Given the uncertainty around office-space needs in the AI era, a flexible approach looks sensible."}],[{"start":139,"text":"Besides, low-rise buildings spread over a larger footprint are better suited to casual interaction and sharing of ideas. Tech firms have traditionally valued this: it is no accident that Google, in Mountain View, and Apple, in Cupertino, pioneered the groundscraper campus. Tech companies are already reshaping the way we live, think and consume; they may also change the way we build."}],[{"start":164.84,"text":""}]],"url":"https://audio.ftcn.net.cn/album/a_1794118200_8954.mp3"}