London, June 23, 2016: People can now buy tickets for the world’s tallest and longest tunnel slide at London’s ArcelorMittal Orbit Tower, which opens to the public for the first time tomorrow.
Artist Carsten Höller — developing on an initial proposal by Bblur Architecture — has designed the 178 m-long (584 ft) helter skelter slide. It’s the latest intervention to the 115 meter-tall (377 ft) Orbit, conceived by Anish Kapoor for the 2012 Olympics, following an abseiling attraction completed last year.
“Since 1999, I have built a number of slides, both free-standing and attached to buildings, but never onto another artwork as in this case,” says Höller, who installed a pair of spiraling slides at the Hayward Galleryfor an exhibition last summer.
“Now that the two artworks will be intertwined with each other, I see it as one of these double situations that I am so interested in.”
The Orbit Tower slide will be made up of 30 sections — 12 of which are now complete — and feature 12 turns, including a tight corkscrew twist. It starts at a height of 74 meters and has a top speed of 15 miles per hour, taking 40 seconds to go down.
Tickets for the attraction cost £15 ($22) and include access to the Orbit’s viewing platform.
London isn’t the only city expecting a helter skelter either, with plans afoot for a glass slide 1,000 ft up Downtown LA’s US Bank Tower.
