A massive building in Shanghai, China, “walked” to its new location using 200 mechanical legs.
The timelapse you will see is incredible, but in reality it took more than two weeks for the building, an 85-year-old elementary school, to rotate 21 degrees and move about 60 meters on its "robotic legs". ”. Engineers relocated the building to clear the area and house a new retail and office complex, which will be completed by 2023.
Over the past few decades, China's rapid modernization has seen many historic buildings razed to clear ground for glittering skyscrapers and office buildings. But there is growing concern about architectural heritage lost to demolition across the country. Such solutions reconcile the need for renewal and dynamism with that of preserving cultural heritage.
A school that moves
The supports act like robotic legs. They are divided into two groups that rise and fall alternately, imitating human walking. Connected sensors help monitor how the building progresses.
Lan Wuji, chief technical supervisor
The company behind this "building walk" is called Shanghai Evolution Shift, and developed this new technology in 2018.
How did it move on robotic legs?
The standard procedure for making buildings walk on robotic legs is complex but not too complex. Workers first had to dig around the building to install the 198 movable supports in the spaces below.
In the second phase of the work, Lan explained, all the building's pillars were severed from the foundations. At this point, the previously installed robotic "legs" rose upwards, and with them the entire building rose. “It's like giving the building crutches so it can stand up and then walk,” explains the engineer.
The last part is easily predictable: one step at a time, the almost centennial school she moved to take a stand in her new space.
Here is the video:
