Tall Building StructureTall buildings have fascinated mankind from the beginning of civilization, their construction being initially for defense and subsequently for ecclesiastical purposes. The growth in modern tall building construction, however, which began in the 1880s, has been largely for commercial and residential purposes.Tall commercial buildings are primarily a response to the demand by business activities to be as close to each other, and to the city center, as possible, thereby putting intense pressure on the available land space. Also, because they form distinctive landmarks, tall commercial buildings are frequently developed in city centers as prestige symbols for corporate organizations.Further, the business and tourist community, with its increasing mobility, has fuelled a need for more, frequently high-rise, city center hotel accommodations.The rapid growth of the urban population and the consequent pressure on limited space have considerably influenced city residential development. The high cost of land, the desire to avoid a continuous urban sprawl, and the need to preserve important agricultural production have all contributed to drive residential buildings upward.Ideally, in the early stages of planning a building, the entire design team, including the architect, structural engineer, and services engineer, should collaborate to agree on a form of structure to satisfy their respective requirements of function, safety and serviceability, and servicing.It is difficult to define a high-rise building . One may say that a low-rise building ranges from 1 to 2 stories . A medium-rise building probably ranges between 3 or 4 stories up to 10 or 20 stories or more . Although the basic principles of vertical and horizontal subsystem design remain the same for low- , medium- , or high-rise buildings , when a building gets high the vertical subsystems become a controlling problem for two reasons . Higher vertical loads will require larger columns , walls , and shafts . But , more significantly , the overturning moment and the shear deflections produced by lateral forces are much larger and must be carefully provided for .The vertical subsystems in a high-rise building transmit accumulated gravity load from story to story , thus requiring larger column or wall sections to support such loading . In addition these same vertical subsystems must transmit lateral loads , such as wind or seismic loads , to the foundations. However , in contrast to vertical load , lateral load effects on buildings are not linear and increase rapidly with increase in height . For example under wind load , the overturning moment at the base of buildings varies approximately as the square of a buildings may vary as the fourth power of buildings height , other things being equal. Earthquake produces an even more pronounced effect.When the structure for a low-or medium-rise building is designed for dead and live load , it is almost an inherent property that the columns , walls , and stair or elevator shafts can carry most of the horizontal forces . The problem is primarily one of shear resistance . Moderate addition bracing for rigid frames in“short”buildings can easily be provided by filling certain panels without increasing the sizes of the columns and girders otherwise required for vertical loads.Unfortunately , this is not is for high-rise buildings because the problem is primarily resistance to moment and deflection rather than shear alone . Special structural arrangements will often have to be made and additional structural material is always required for the columns , girders , walls , and slabs in order to made a high-rise buildings sufficiently resistant to much higher lateral deformations . As previously mentioned , the quantity of structural material required per square foot of floor of a high-rise buildings is in excess of that required for low-rise buildings . The vertical components carrying the gravity load , such as walls , columns , and shafts , will need to be strengthened over the full height of the buildings . But quantity of material required for resisting lateral forces is even more significant .With reinforced concrete , the quantity of material also increases as the number of stories increases . But here it should be noted that the increase in the weight of material added for gravity load is much more sizable than steel , whereas for wind load the increase for lateral force resistance is not that much more since the weight of a concrete buildings helps to resist overturn . On the other hand , the problem of design for earthquake forces . Additional mass in the upper floors will give rise to a greater overall lateral force under the of seismic effects . In the case of either concrete or steel design , there are certain basic principles for providing additional resistance to lateral to lateral forces and deflections in high-rise buildings without too much sacrifire in economy .