Dolmen City Project

Sprawling development includes offices, hotel, shopping mall

submitted by Sanaullah Khan

One of the largest and most prestigious mixed-use projects Karachi, Pakistan, has seen, Dolmen City stands in front of the Arabian sea with a total built area of 4.2 million ft². Designed by architecture and interior design practice Ashad Shahid Abdullah Pvt. Ltd. and consulting engineering firm Mushtaq and Bilal, the development includes a 20-story office building, the Harbour Front; a 12-story office building, the Executive Tower; a 39-story office building, Tower A; and a 39-story, office and hotel building with five floors of parking, Tower B. Dolmen Mall Clifton, Pakistan’s largest shopping mall with three floors and 1 million ft² of retail and dining space, is also encompassed in this project owned by Dolmen Pvt. Ltd. 

Tokyo, Japan-headquartered Mitsubishi Electric Corp. supplied the Dolmen City project with the latest vertical-transportation (VT) technology including:

• Six 150 m/min elevators with 1350-kg capacity in The Harbour Front
• 12 high-speed (240 m/min) elevators with 1600-kg capacity in Tower A
• 12 high-speed (240 m/min) elevators with 1600-kg capacity in Tower B
• 23 elevators, 10 escalators and six moving walks in the Dolmen Mall 

In Tower A, 11 elevators serve 38 floors, with one service/firefighter’s elevator serving 39 floors. Elevators in Tower B are divided into lower and upper banks. Six elevators in the lower bank serve the 24 floors of the office building. The upper bank serves the hotel with four elevators for the upper 16 stories and two service/firefighting elevators. A total of 24 high-speed, energy-efficient Mitsubishi elevators in Towers A and B feature advanced technology such as ∑AI2200C group control and Destination Orientation Allocation Systems (DOAS) with integrated card readers at all floors and security gates at selected floors. Installed by RESCO Pvt. Ltd., the access control system allows passengers to scan their IDs at the card reader at security gates, after which DOAS will automatically assign them an elevator car based on their preset destination floor. Passing through the gate, riders will see a car number indicated and can go directly to that car, minimizing congestion at the elevator bank. The same process is followed at hall operating panels on floors with card readers. ∑AI2200C group control uses AI and the latest advancements in “fuzzy-logic” to reduce user wait times, travel time and energy consumption. 

The VT system includes several special fixtures, including LED hall operating panels, 15-in. liquid crystal displays (LCD) in the car and hall and projected prism hall lanterns. The elevators are also outfitted with Mitsubishi’s MelEye elevator monitoring and control system and are equipped to provide for safe evacuation of passengers in case of an earthquake emergency. Additionally, all elevators have fire-rated doors, with service/firefighter’s elevators having Fire Service Mode. Roller guide shoes reduce vibration and ensure a comfortable ride. Each elevator’s regenerative converter transmits power generated during traction machine operation back into the electric network, providing an energy savings of around 35% and reducing harmonic current.