High technology: engineering London's "Shard"

As London architects and engineers work on what will be Europe’s tallest building, Jon Excell investigates the challenges of going high-rise after 9/11.

The mighty skyscraper. Stretching upwards, dominating the skyline, dwarfing its neighbours and inspiring awe. It’s hard to imagine a more potent architectural symbol of wealth and capitalist aspiration.

And if one of the aims of September 11, 2001 was to consign such symbols to dust then it has failed conspicuously. For the worlds’ architects, planners and civil engineers are apparently determined to scale ever more dizzying heights.

Today — from New York to Hong Kong to Dubai — an unprecedented number of staggeringly tall buildings are on the verge of making their mark on the skyline. And UK engineers aren’t about to be left gazing enviously skyward either — full planning permission is now in place for the 70-storey, 310m-high London Bridge Tower.

London’s latest high-rise project won’t exactly dwarf the proposed 541m-high Freedom Tower (the likely successor to the World Trade Centre) or the current holder of the world’s tallest building mantle (the 508m-high Taipei 101). But the Shard of Glass — as it is affectionately dubbed by those working on the project — will, at its projected 2010 completion date, be the tallest building in Europe.