Q1

Upon its completion in 2005 the Q1 tower will become the world's tallest residential building. Located on Hamilton Avenue on the Gold Coast, Australia Q1 will also be the tallest free-standing structure in the country, beating the 274m Mt Isa Chimney stack for the title. At 322m high it edges out both the Eiffel tower (321m) and the Chrysler building (319m) also. Previous Gold coast structures have held the highest residential title no less than 15 times since the first highrise was built there in 1957.

• Height 322 m 1,056 ft
• Floors (over ground) 78
• Floors (under ground) 2
• Year (start) 2002
• Year (end) 2005
• Parking places 730
• Units (rooms) 527

The elevators in this building will be the fastest in Australia at 9.0m/s (1772ft/min) and are made by the Kone company. The spire atop the structure will be the world's longest, measuring 176m in length. It begins at level 50 (146m) and extends 47m above the glass fin at the top of the building.

As you can see this building is set to break several records but I'm not convinced that the unit price of AU $895,000 (upper floors) is worth it considering the recent terrorist threats against Australia. This structure seems like too good a target...