The world's tallest elevator testing tower has just opened in Inazawa City, Japan, and is named Solae. Why would you build a tower just to test elevators? Because the world's tallest buildings (including Taipei 101, which I rode in last year) have a need to install elevators that take you from floor 1 to floor "high" really fast. Solae will be used by Mitsubishi to test their latest drives, gears and cables in a controlled environment instead of say, a mall in downtown Tokyo. If Mitsubishi can lift me 100 stories in a minute, they can figure out a way to build a better looking Galant. [BBC]

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