We’ve looked at many of the world’s largest things in the past, so for something different, let’s look at the longest. Karl-Marx-Hof in Vienna is the world’s longest residential building, stretching more than a kilometre through the 19th district better known for large houses and diplomatic residences.

The building consists of almost 1,400 apartments, meant to house up to 5,000 people. The design included amenities such as a swimming pool, library, laundries, shops, a school and medical facilities. Only the eastern side of the building stretches the full 1,100 metres, but in many sections there are blocks on the western side of the development which create internal courtyards and parks for the residents.

It was constructed by city planner Karl Ehn as part of the Socialist Party’s Red Vienna movement which saw huge quantities of public housing constructed when private housing development was unfeasible due to rent freezes. A special tax was imposed to allow these massive constructions to proceed, while the use of renowned architects ensured the buildings were varied and visually attractive, something very apparent on Bing Maps’ bird’s eye view.

The apartments were some of the first in the city to each include a toilet, running water and balconies – luxuries that workers of the time had never experienced before. Today, however, they are less desirable due to their small size and the fact that many don’t have showers or other modern facilities.

Several tunnels had to be incorporated into the design to allow the continuation of city streets and traffic flow.

The building suffered heavy damage during the Austrian Civil War of 1934 when military and police forces took severe action, bombarding the building to force out unarmed families and Party workers who were barricaded inside.  This damage wasn’t repaired until some years after World War 2.

Many pictures of Karl Marx Hof can be found at the Great Buildings website.

The world of gargantuan statuary has changed considerably since we published the original Very Large Buddhas post just over 3 years ago. The title of world’s largest statue is now held by the Spring Temple Buddha in Henan, China.

The statue alone is 128m tall, and it stands on a 20m tall lotus throne, which in turn stands on a 25m tall pedestal – giving the structure a total height of 153m.

The statue – including the lotus throne – is 128m tall. Its original 25m tall pedestal gave the structure a total height of 153m. However, recent information shows that the hill it was built on has been constructed into an additional pedestal. The total height is now believed to be 208m. Panoramio has several pictures, and this image in particular gives you a sense of just how immense this monument is (and shows the new pedestal under construction.)

Little is known about the Spring Temple Buddha in the West, so it likely wasn’t listed on Wikipedia when Alex wrote the original post. It was constructed in 2002 in response to Taliban bombing of Buddha statues in Afghanistan, as well as to thwart Indian plans to create the world’s largest statue.  I haven’t been able to find any vital statistics about it, but this image seems to show that the toes alone are close to 2m high.

The world’s second largest statue is the Laykyun Setkyar in Myanmar, which is so new (completed in 2008) that we only see it partially constructed on Google Maps.

At 116m on a 13.5m pedestal it is barely taller in total than the Spring Temple statue alone. Panoramio has a few pictures of the completed structure, which also show that it is, interestingly, located near a reclining Buddha which, at 90m in length, would probably be the world’s 9th tallest statue if it was upright.

As it is also located in a somewhat secretive country, detailed statistics are similarly hard to find. The regime consistently claims it is the world’s largest though, despite evidence to the contrary.

The world’s third largest statue is Ushiku Daibutsu in Japan. It was featured in the original Very Large Buddhas post, though there is new imagery that shows it in greater detail.

Thanks to Lukasz for the link to the reclining Buddha, and to Alex for letting me update his original post.

Today, the fourteenth of July, is the French national holiday that is known in English as Bastille day.

The Bastille, a Parisian prison, was stormed on this day in 1789. Along with the Tennis Court Oath, it was the successful capture of the Bastille that marked the beginning of the French Revolution.

The Bastille was actually demolished that same year, and in its location is now Place de la Bastille which, fittingly for Paris, is now a large roundabout. Don’t be fooled however, as the July column at the centre is actually a monument to a different revolution (the one when King Charles X was overthrown in 1830).

To the south-east is the Opéra Bastille, which was completed in 1989 and was intended to replace the old Opéra Garnier (Wikipedia) as the home of the National Opera of Paris. However such is the demand for opera in Paris that the two buildings are both still used – along with three others!

Looking around the streets you can see where the walls of the Bastille used to stand marked out with lighter coloured paving stones. During excavation for the Paris Metro in 1899, partial remains of one of the fort’s towers were discovered and put on display in the nearby Square Galli.

Thanks to Julien, who originally posted a French version of this post over at Google Sightseeing Français!

For our first post about Finland, we visit the capital Helsinki where we find Temppeliaukio – a circular dome-roofed rock church carved into a large granite outcropping.

Rather more modern than the Ethiopian Rock Churches which I wrote about recently, Temppeliaukio was originally conceived before the second world war. Construction was finally completed in 1969, at a quarter of the originally-intended size. I assume the Church would have filled most of the rocky area clearly visible from Bing Maps’ bird’s eye view.

The image of a space ship surrounded by rock originally created some controversy, but over time it has grown to become one of Helsinki’s leading tourist attractions.

Temppeliaukio is perhaps best appreciated from the inside where the bare granite walls and gleaming copper dome are lit with natural light from 180 windows which separate those two elements of the structure.

Rock excavated for the interior of the Church was used to build up the walls, and to create the entranceway. While the walls were originally supposed to be covered over, it was decided to leave the rock bare as it created excellent acoustics for musical performances.

Thanks to kockopes.

Despite Indonesia having more Muslims than any other nation in the world, making up 87% of its total population, the government’s pseudo-religious tolerance¹ is seen within several religious buildings, all standing within a few city blocks of Indonesia’s central seat of power and the highest court in the land.

With over 200 million Muslims in a country whose “religious freedom” is mere decades old it is not difficult to see the significance of these Muslim, Hindu, and Christian influenced buildings.

What you don’t expect to see in the heart of Indonesia is a 100 year old Catholic cathedral. Yet, there it is.

The Central Catholic Cathedral (Gereja Katedral) is the seat of the Archbishop of Jakarta. The current building is a rebuild of the original that was burnt down in the mid-1800s. On Christmas Eve, 2004, the church was the target of a blast bomb attack.

What you do expect to see in a highly populated Muslim country is a mosque. Just a 150 meters from the great doors of the Cathedral are the great halls of the largest mosque in Southeast Asia.

What is significant about The Independence Mosque (Istiqlal Mosque), besides its size, is that its designer was not a Muslim at all. In fact, he was a Christian architect that won the job as part of a contest held by the government in the 1960s. The mosque would take 17 years to build.

Just one block away from The Independence, the same Christian architect, Frederich Silaban, designed another one of Jakarta’s treasured monuments, the National Monument (Monumen Nasional or MONAS); this time taking his influences primarily from the Hindu religion.

Taking 14 years to build, the National Monment is a 137m tall tower that supposedly symbolises the fight for Indonesia’s independence. Visitors generally stand for hours in long lines while they wait to ride up the old, rickety 11-passenger elevator up the deliberately phallic-looking shaft to the central viewing platform. The design of the monument supposedly “combines elements of the male and female physiology”, symbolising fertility in the Hindu-Javanese tradition.

All three of these religiously influenced buildings demonstrate, to a certain extent, Indonesia’s religious tolerance. For if we just cross the street from the National Monument, we will come upon the Presidential Palace (Istana Merdeka) and the Supreme Court of Justice (Mahkama Agung); arguably the nation’s most important political buildings.

The Presidential Palace / The Supreme Court of Justice

From the viewing platform of the National Monument tourists can photograph all of the buildings discussed here within a single panoramic frame. The President’s home, the Supreme Court, the largest mosque in SE Asia, and the central Catholic cathedral all from an Hindu-influenced monument. An impressive vista for sure.

Thanks to Perry Ismangil.