COLOMBO - Sri Lanka is set to build the tallest tower in the South Asian region, the government announced recently. The 350 metre high tower building, the promoters claim, will be visible to India and Bangladesh.
Estimated to cost more than $104 million, the "Lotus Tower" will provide facilities for 50 television services, 50 broadcasting services and 10 telecommunication providers. In addition to its primary function, the tower podium, which is proposed to be four storeys high, will accommodate a telecommunication museum, food courts, offices, conference hall and exhibition spaces.
Two floors of the 11 storyed multi-faceted tower is also planned to be developed with luxury hotel accommodation, a revolving restaurant accommodating 600 guests on the fourth floor and a banquet hall for over a thousand guests.
Planned to be built in a three hectare land in the heart of Colombo, the Lotus Tower is one of Sri Lanka's many development projects designed to help the country's rapidly growing tourism industry. Since the end of its three-decade ethnic conflict, the country is emerging as one of the most popular tourist destinations of the region.The project through its telecommunication infrastructure also aims at eliminating high-powered TV and FM antennas perched atop buildings around Colombo as part of the government's Colombo beautification plan. The tower mast, fixed upon the tower head is arranged to provide a base for antennas of service providers in telecommunication, telecasting, broadcasting, and defence-related transmission with the antenna installed 350 metres above ground.
The Director-General of the Telecommunication Regulatory Commission, Anusha Pelpita, said that there will be a significant development in the television and telecommunication.
The Lotus Tower will be the tallest building in South Asia and the 19th tallest building in the world. It will be 26-metre taller than the Eiffel Tower and 17.4-metre taller than the 332.6-metre high Tokyo Tower. The Tokyo Sky Tree with a height of 634 meters presently being constructed and scheduled to be completed in February this year, will be the tallest tower in the world followed by the Canton Tower of China with a height of 600 metres.
The construction of the Lotus Tower is planned to be completed in 30 months and funded by EXIM Bank of the People's Republic of China.
