Episode Details

What keeps skyscrapers standing, what limits their height, and does a fully vertical city actually change the geology beneath it? This episode dives into the material science and structural engineering behind the global skyscraper boom — from Bessemer steel and tuned mass dampers to the self-weight problem that caps concrete towers at roughly one mile. Plus: why elevator ropes fail above 500 meters, how Hong Kong and New York compare on per-capita density, and the unsettling answer to whether all that weight presses the earth down.