Is New York done with skyscrapers?

[MRoberts]

I don't mean to upset anyone, but as an afficionado of skyscrapers for years, I've noted that since the 1980's New York City seems to have fallen behind other cities in the arena of skyscrapers. http://ultrapolisproject.com/ultrapolis_017.htm shows New York City is now down to 4th place in terms of tallest cities, and says that Hong Kong, Shanghai, Kuala Lumpu, Dubai and many other cities are building dazzling new ultramodern superskyscrapers and space age towers, while New York has not done anything really big since the 1930's except the WTC themselves (and, of course, now the Freedom Tower - which will be eclipsed before it is even finshed by the new tower in Dubai).
I was wondering what New Yorkers interested in architecure think about all this? Even the Freedom Tower itself seems to be opposed by some New Yorkers (although so was the Empire State Building when it was being built - it was derisively called the 'Empty State Building' by many for years). Is it that New Yorkers just don't see themselves as trendsetters in this area anymore? Or is it that New Yorkers don't even realize how other cities are overtaking them? It just seems like this was such a defining aspect of the city for so long, seems strange to see it simply stop in this respect.
I am not a New Yorker, though I've been many times, and have loved every visit.

[hella good]

new york will never be 'done' with skyscrapers. buildings over 100 feet are hard to get into the pipeline in such a historic city, planning reasons, money reasons, nimby's reasons all restrict the size of buildings. The city will have a comeback i can tell you that right now. Weve got NYT tower, BOA, con ed, and the ghery tower to come, which will be large, not to mention the towers at ground zero.

[Fabrizio]

"Is it that New Yorkers just don't see themselves as trendsetters in this area anymore? Or is it that New Yorkers don't even realize how other cities are overtaking them? It just seems like this was such a defining aspect of the city for so long, seems strange to see it simply stop in this respect".

NYC went 40 long long years without building a skyscraper to rival the Chrysler or the ESB.... during those 40 years, NYC did very well. Is having "the tallest" really so important? In 1930, building that tall was a spectacular feat; it truly signified something.... but isn't the world today about other technologies and frontiers?

[BrooklynRider]

Bloomberg, NY Times Tower, BoA, Freedom Tower, Beekman Place, 80 South Street.

[ablarc]

Bloomberg, NY Times Tower, BoA, Freedom Tower, Beekman Place, 80 South Street.
BrooklynRider, you can't answer this one with a list of achievements if you accept the premise in the question that New York's performance now falls short of other places'. hellagood also lists New York's 'scrapers in the pipeline, but MRoberts has already stated in his question that these aren't enough for New York to keep first place, by ultrapolisproject's criteria at least.

So, more interesting than defensiveness or an SSP-style pissing contest would be a thoughtful answer to the question. Fabrizio attempts that, but it's unconvincing; he refers to "other technologies and frontiers", but those are computers and biotech, and New York isn't a leader in those either.

hellagood nails it, I think: it's NIMBYs and their bizarre theories about the evils of tallness. Zoning laws and government review processes lend far too much weight to the views of these nay-sayers.

Another reason might be the natural curve that leads from youthful brashness (Dubai, etc.) to sober maturity (NY, which has been doing the world's tallest buildings for a century); but that makes New York seem like a geriatric case.

I'd rather see New York regain the lead than have us claim we never lost it in the first place. We're talking strictly about skylines here, and there's no doubt that Hong Kong's has a bigger wow factor.

With a few 2000-footers, New York would break through the flat-top skyline we seem increasingly stuck with; that would give us a fresh dose of self-esteem not based on defensive pointing to past glories or relatively modest present achievements.

[Ninjahedge]

Who cares?

And really, do these people rate a city on the height of their buildings? I hate to say it, but a lot of the cities that are "beating" us are doing so because they have the land to DO it.

I have seen alot of other "big" cities in the world, but NYC is undoubtedly one of the denest conglomerations of tall buildings over the largest area I have ever seen.

And pardon people for being NIMBYs if what is being planned on their back yard is not a bird feeder but a monolithic glass and steel structure that will block all but a small bit of what was previously their own corner of the world.


NIMBY is not always a bad word you know.


PS, the true route of NIMBY is from the people that push for something, but do not want it in THEIR back yard.

So, Alb. Where do you live? Would you want a skyscraper in your back or front yard? Do you have a view? Do you live in a brownstone? WOuld you want a skyscraper in what was previously your small close-knit neighborhood?

[hella good]

to be honest i dont care if other cities are 'overtaking' new york, its a great city and its skyline has developed over a hundred years. that is some development and some feat, it has always set the trends and these cities that are being built over five years have no culture or history. the city is just maturing thats all.

[Fabrizio]

Ablarc:

"Another reason might be the natural curve that leads from youthful brashness (Dubai, etc.) to sober maturity (NY, which has been doing the world's tallest buildings for a century); but that makes New York seem like a geriatric case".

Does London seem like a geriatric case?

[Ninjahedge]

London WAS calling...


But it only got his answering machine.

[BrooklynRider]

BrooklynRider, you can't answer this one with a list of achievements if you accept the premise in the question that New York's performance now falls short of other places'...

I don't accept the premise.



So, more interesting than defensiveness or an SSP-style pissing contest would be a thoughtful answer to the question. Fabrizio attempts that, but it's unconvincing... hellagood nails it...

Perhaps, more interesting to YOU. But, this isn't the "ablarc forum" - is it?

The reality is that no one person's opinion is "the standard" against which we will all be measured. And, the introduction of a series of tall and supertall buildings as evidence against the premise that New York is no longer interested in building tall, seems to not warrant further argument.

[Johnnyboy]

New York may be down at fourth for now but due to the 1,000+ skyscrapers
being proposed and build, New York will move up. I see alot of opportunities for New York and we will all be seeing alot of improvements in New York construction projects.

[Johnnyboy]

dam terrorists.

[Fabrizio]

Brooklyn: let´s be fair in quoting....ablarc´s exact quote is: "hellagood nails it, I think".

The "I think" gives it the proper context.

[ablarc]

Ablarc:

"Another reason might be the natural curve that leads from youthful brashness (Dubai, etc.) to sober maturity (NY, which has been doing the world's tallest buildings for a century); but that makes New York seem like a geriatric case".

Does London seem like a geriatric case?
It did until Livingstone came along. Resting on its laurels, all the new stuff timid and bad.

Now they're doing some of the best skyscrapers anywhere; London's reinventing itself in dynamic fashion and providing mostly good example.

Ninjahedge, I doubt anyone on this forum needs reminding that skyscrapers aren't the essence of excellence in any city, nor that some abominable acts have been stopped by organized protest.

MRoberts asked a legitimate question based on an observation that isn't hard to understand: New York's current crop of skyscrapers is middlin', and it wasn't always so.

As for the contention that any entrenched tenant's view or sunlight should be sacred: that's preposterous.

When community opposition to a new project is good, it's because the interests of the entire community are represented; and that community is everybody on the globe; we're all keepers of the world's heritage. That's the kind of representation that saved Grand Central, not some selfish jerk's objection to having his precious view blocked. To that I say: "so what?"

[BrooklynRider]

Is it that New Yorkers just don't see themselves as trendsetters in this area anymore?

Trendsetting is more exciting when you are blazing a new path and actually creating the new trend. The initial building of skyscrapers was trendsetting. It's been done and New York and Chicago did it.



Or is it that New Yorkers don't even realize how other cities are overtaking them?

I think New Yorkers would always like to host the tallest building in the world, but we are also realists. Other cities might overtake us in height or numbers of skyscrapers, but, I think, as a city we are pretty confident in our stature. I don't see an argument in pursuing a race against "lists".


It just seems like this was such a defining aspect of the city for so long, seems strange to see it simply stop in this respect.

It wasn't so much a defining aspect of "the city" as it was a defining aspect of individuals and companies - who happened to be based here. The globalization of the economy has spread the wealth and the construction. Rather than seeing a 2500ft Bank of America Tower in one city, you see 500 to 1000 foot Bank of America buildings around the nation and world.

It's not 1930 anymore.

[Fabrizio]

Ablarc: MRoberts concern is about NYC´s failure to keep up in the race to build tall.

"Is it that New Yorkers just don't see themselves as trendsetters in this area anymore? Or is it that New Yorkers don't even realize how other cities are overtaking them?"

He is talking about NYC being overtaken in the building of "tall towers" by the likes of "Hong Kong, Shanghai, Kuala Lumpu, Dubai..."

London maybe doing "some of the best skyscrapers anywhere" but the subject is about building tall. Do you really think London is concerned that Hong Kong, Shanghai, Kuala Lumpu and Dubai are building taller? It´s just not a concern. Even so, I don´t think London can be accused of being "geriatric" because of it.... nor can NY.

You also write: "As for the contention that any entrenched tenant's view or sunlight should be sacred: that's preposterous".

Ablarc, it is also preposterous to think that people will not fight for their quality of life.

[sfenn1117]

We have tried to build many tall buildings.......Travelstead, South Ferry, Television City, but for various reasons they never went through.

Obviously 9/11 put a gaping hole in the skyline in the most horrific way possible......but it bothers me that some on this forum lament the loss of the towers over the loss of human life.

Currently we're building taller than we have since the early days, with many 1,000 footers. Yet, they are only 1,000 footers by spire. Still in 5 years our top 10 will dramatically change. BOA disappoints me, I wouldn't mind seeing a 1,500 foot building there, such a prime location, probably the last great development site in midtown. Our final frontier is the West Side......we have to build tall there. If you think 1,000 footers will actually be built on the ConEd site....you're dreaming. Probably more ~750 footers like the rest of midtown. But downtown in 5 years= Something amazing. 3 new icon buildings.....Gehry, Calatrava, Freedom. But after these are built, there's practically no more room to build large towers downtown.

The sad reality is......it's Dubai's turn. NY built new and ever higher worlds tallest buildings from the early 1900s to the 1970s. Then Sears Tower was built, and NYC lost that title forever. Yes, I said forever. However tacky Dubai may be, they are proposing 2,000 foot buildings left and right, one being well off the ground.

In 50 years, maybe there will be a need for futuristic 2,000 foot buildings, a la Star Wars, but today, there isn't, at least in NY. But I'm still happy to live in the greatest city in the world, WTB or not, there are still thousands of skyscrapers to entertain us and keep us happy.

[TonyO]

New York's rate of building skyscrapers isn't at pace with some other skyscraper hubs and so NY is in decline in this respect? Did you ever consider that those cities will also go through their own slow-downs and that NY's pace may pick up?

This is simply a perception issue and a superficial one at that.

[yyy]

It's really not size that matters - I like some NY skyscrapers more than any others in the world even if they're not the tallest ones. And also even if not all are new - the first ones, like the Chrysler building and ESB, looks better than some new ones. The Sears tower, for example, doesn't look so good in contrast to most of the NYC buildings, even though it's taller than them.

What I'd want to see in NY are good looking buildings and not necessarily taller ones.

[NYatKNIGHT]

I would like to see some good looking taller ones. After all, tall buildings have been Manhattan's physical distinctness for a century.

[elfgam]

It's really not size that matters - I like some NY skyscrapers more than any others in the world even if they're not the tallest ones. And also even if not all are new - the first ones, like the Chrysler building and ESB, looks better than some new ones. The Sears tower, for example, doesn't look so good in contrast to most of the NYC buildings, even though it's taller than them.

What I'd want to see in NY are good looking buildings and not necessarily taller ones.

It's a sad commentary on the state of architecture that size and quality are put as two opposing characteristics. Thankfully, I think your fears are misplaced. In Chicago, SOM's 7 Dearborn (does anyone have an image of it to upload?) would have been amazingly beautiful, and amazingly tall. Calatrava's propsed 2000-footer there is gorgeous well. Norman Foster's proposal for the WTC also was amazing. The problem is indeed that the same closed minded attitude in New Yorker's that pevents truly TALL buildings from being built also, in general, prevents truly GREAT buildings from being built as well.

As for room? Many of these cities are building these amazing buildings not in their central, developed cores but at the periphery. Who says we can't have the world's tallest building in Brooklyn or on the north shore of staten island, or in Long Island City?

[ablarc]

Ablarc, it is also preposterous to think that people will not fight for their quality of life.
You could say, "Let 'em fight, just so they don't win." Problem is, in the process of fighting they often bottle up a project long enough that it's abandoned.

That way, they get to keep their view or their sunshine; and the rest of the world --starting with the developer, the job-seekers, the tax departments and ending with us unimportant urbanophiles-- all lose.

[MRoberts]

First, as someone who has lived in other countries for many years, I can tell you that New York City, Empire State Building, and skyscrapers, are synonymous around the world, even today. It is natural that the city would be identified and defined by an aspect of architecture in which it had been uniquely preeminent for so long.

I think ablarc has really helped get to root of the matter, in part by some of the responses he has provoked. I think some have exposed unwittingly, why New York City is no longer the leader it was once was. For example: regulations and parochial interest now trump any grand designs in ways they didn’t back in the 1920’s and 30’s. Perhaps New York has reached a point of ‘maturity,’ where leading in the field of super skyscrapers is no longer important – nothing wrong with that. But, as ablarc points out, NYC is noit leading in the other fields noted by others as important.

However, when I visit my friends in NYC, I get the feeling that New Yorkers assume that NYC will always be at the center of the world, just as Londoners did 100 years ago. But, London was replaced – by New York. London is still a great city, it is no New York or Hong Kong. I venture to say that the characteristics of youth, vigor, brashness, (slight immaturity?) that catapulted New York to the top are the same ones you find today in Hong Kong and Shanghai, and the skyscrapers they build are more than just dazzling – they portend of things to come.

[Fabrizio]

Ablarc:

You write ".....they get to keep their view or their sunshine; and the rest of the world --starting with the developer, the job-seekers, the tax departments and ending with us unimportant urbanophiles-- all lose".

There is another scenario: the developer is forced to build lower and the neighborhood retains it´s characteristic ambience and becomes ever more desirable as a place to live and visit. Other similair new structures are built sensitive to the neighborhood´s established feel. Older buildings are restored and renovated. New business come in. And so on.

The developers, the job-seekers, the tax departments and ending with us unimportant urbanophiles-- all win.

[Eugenius]

When talking about a "race," it is important to note who is competing. In New York, with the notable exception of the WTC, the construction of tall buildings was spearheaded by real estate developers and private corporations. As a result, New York's skyscrapers, whether supertall or middling, were always practical and profit-driven. New York never competed for "image." That's what always separated New York from Dubai. In New York, skyscrapers are a necessity dictated by real estate economics. In Dubai, the supertall is a gimmick, just like "the world's biggest couch" or "worlds biggest gathering of men named Mohammed."

If you look at the range of supertalls built in Kuala Lumpur, Shanghai and Taipei, you'll note a common feature - they are government sponsored, and they are unprofitable. A recent post noted that Taipei 101 is about 30% full. No developer would build a structure in New York with those kinds of economics.

[ablarc]

There is another scenario: the developer is forced to build lower and the neighborhood retains it´s characteristic ambience and becomes ever more desirable as a place to live and visit. Other similair new structures are built sensitive to the neighborhood´s established feel. Older buildings are restored and renovated. New business come in. And so on.

The developers, the job-seekers, the tax departments and ending with us unimportant urbanophiles-- all win.
Can't argue with that; doing so would be agreeing to be cast as straw man.

Now, how about if a place isn't necessarily best served by a low rise, except in the minds of the NIMBYs? Plenty of examples of that.

[hella good]

it is true that many new yorkers think that it is the centre of the world, and in a lot of ways it is. it doesnt need to put itself in the skyscraper race anymore, its past that. it is at a classy stage. whereas some cities could be quite 'low class' and others middle, new york can be one of the cities that is at the top of the upper class. it has gained its profile and will never lose it.

although i think that this is not the main issue, as someone has already pointed out there is not always a great need for skyscrapers, especially now that other cities are being chosen for headquarters instead of new york. and it doesnt matter either.

im sure that one day there will be a major surge again and the city will be top of the charts. until then lets just take it as it comes.

[Fabrizio]

MRoberts:

"I venture to say that the characteristics of youth, vigor, brashness, (slight immaturity?) that catapulted New York to the top are the same ones you find today in Hong Kong and Shanghai, and the skyscrapers they build are more than just dazzling – they portend of things to come".

I don´t think so. You´re forgetting that NYC is an American city... it represented democracy and freedom. Hong Kong is part of China. I just doubt that it or cities like Shanghai, Kuala Lumpu, or Dubai are going to be the new guiding lights for the world...

[ablarc]

I don´t think so. You´re forgetting that NYC is an American city... it represented democracy and freedom. Hong Kong is part of China. I just doubt that it or cities like Shanghai, Kuala Lumpu, or Dubai are going to be the new guiding lights for the world...
Rhetorical sleight of hand: neither building skyscrapers or inspiring the building of skyscrapers has to do with democracy and freedom.

The sun rose today and I saw an accident on my way to work. That doesn't mean sunrises cause accidents.

[Ninjahedge]

Can't argue with that; doing so would be agreeing to be cast as straw man.

Now, how about if a place isn't necessarily best served by a low rise, except in the minds of the NIMBYs? Plenty of examples of that.

How do you "serve" a place if the people that live in it are not being served?

Yo ucan build a great adventure in Grenwitch village and the revenues would be very large, but all the people living there would move out from the "happy people" riding the scream machine. (Extreme example).


NYC was built on finances, and a private feeling that we could build a financial center/capital that the world would have to not only acnowledge, but follow. The people who built them USED them, there was no real government fund for the development of the supertall!

Now places put in their own "Arabic Disney" (Dubai) and we are supposed to look at it as if that town is now more of a world player because it has the tallest unoccupied building in the world?

Measuring urban development by the sheer size of a structure is one of the most ironically infantile phallic driven pieces of crap I have heard of. The tall buildings were what New York was made of, not what made New York.



Oh, also, as for building tall buildings in the surrounding districts, that would not be the same. People do not consider Downtown Brooklyn to be NYC. They consider it to be, well, BROOKLYN! Although they are both technically IN NYC, they do not fit the same world distinction.


So all these cities that were NOT built on an island and have plenty of sprawl space are building huge buildings in what is also not an expensive area to aquire land, while NYC, with residences AVERAGING at over $1M and still home to millions of working people from miles around, is losing the competition because it does not have the tallest buildings.....

Hmm. OK.

We lose. Now pardon me, I have some buildings to design.

[Fabrizio]

Ablarc: follow the thread. MRoberts writes:


"However, when I visit my friends in NYC, I get the feeling that New Yorkers assume that NYC will always be at the center of the world, just as Londoners did 100 years ago. But, London was replaced – by New York. London is still a great city, it is no New York or Hong Kong. I venture to say that the characteristics of youth, vigor, brashness, (slight immaturity?) that catapulted New York to the top are the same ones you find today in Hong Kong and Shanghai, and the skyscrapers they build are more than just dazzling – they portend of things to come."

Note: "the characteristics of youth, vigor, brashness, (slight immaturity?) that catapulted New York to the top are the same ones you find today in Hong Kong and Shanghai..."

He also talks about London as a great city being "replaced" by NYC and alludes to Hong Kong and Shanghai as possibly doing the same. Becoming the world´s NEXT great cities.... replacing NYC.

I doubt it. Besides youth, vigor, brashness and immaturity catapulting New York to the top, I say it was also it´s freedom and democracy ....those concepts were an important part of that city becoming great... of being a standard... a point of reference...an example. I doubt that Shanghai, Kuala Lumpu, or Dubai will ever become places to look to and become truly great cities. They´ll be cities with very dazziling skyscrapers...no doubt exciting, and economic engines... but "great" as NYC or London? I guess it depends on your idea or "great". I think they can only be as great as the countries they find themselves in. As I said, I doubt that they´ll ever become guiding lights for the world...

[elfgam]

1. London was replaced by New York, yet now is back on the cutting edge is well on its way to replacing NY as the most dynamic city on earth.

2. The points on this thread are right: the super-tall buildings in NYC are the result of private need, private money, and private power -- not the artificial creation of some totalitarian state (China, Dubai, Malaysia, etc.) trying to push national pride. Let's not forget that if we have a class A vacancy rate of 8% it's a bad year, whereas in Shanghai right now they have a vacancy rate of more than 60% in the pudong. China WILLED Shanghai's new downtown into existence to be able to say that it will compete with NY, whether it makes economic sense or not.

3. That being said, though, the lack of new super-tall skyscrapers in NY is abundantly clear... IT'S TO EXPENSIVE TO BUILD THEM HERE. If this were not so, private developers would build them. To build super-tall in NYC is too expensive because of taxes, zoning, labor costs, material costs, and the guaranteed years of lawsuits and government/public intervention. If we would only make it cheaper then developers would jump at the opportunity to build super tall. For example: city could zone several blocks in mid-town west (as it is doing) with no zoning or heights limits and limit tax on property value to say bottom 40 stories only.

4. Multi-polar cities are the wave of the future (look at London, or Manhattan now, or Shanghai, or Hong Kong). Saying the Brooklyn is not Manhattan changes nothing. Allow the big developments to spring up in Long Island City -- no height restrictions, nothing -- who's there to protest or be bothered? Allow this to be the sister zone to Mid-town, it's close enough -- it could become the canary wharf or La Defense to Manhattan.

[MRoberts]

I’d like to think that Fabrizio is right that somehow freedom and democracy have something to do with maintaining (or even guaranteeing) a city’s preeminence. However, history over the last 5,000 years does not show that to be the case (please do not cite our current experience as that would be tautological). Besides, who is to say China won’t continue to reform, allowing Hong Kong or Shanghai to eventually even Fabrizio’s idea of what the world’s greatest city should be?

I’m glad Fabrizio values New York’s position as the leading proponent of American ideals. I just don’t see that it is guaranteed.

My interest of course, is in skyscrapers, and how New Yorkers view how they’ve been eclipsed in recent years in this respect. Do they care? (apparently, many don’t). Are they in denial of how much the architectural excitement has moved elsewhere? (I’m getting a little bit of this feeling, but I may be premature).



By the way, as I understand it, the WTC and the Empire State were built with government involvement, and both were opposed on the grounds that they were not needed (too many vacancies).

[ablarc]

MRoberts, see what you have done? Ask a simple question, and fifteen hours later, you have 33 answers.

Denial? You bet.

[Ninjahedge]

Denial? You bet.

No it isn't.



Anyway, elf, multipolar does have something to do with how the town itself is viewed. It is no longer seen as THE center, but a conglomoration of centers. What would happen if Jersey City were to become as built up as midtown Manhattan? Would that mean that NYC woudl now be considered the largest, or would it simply make the NYC AREA the largest? I would not see building up LIC, Yonkers or Brooklyn as adding to NYC, and neither would the world.

Right or wrong, it is a question of perception.

PS, thank GOD for NIMBYS in some areas. If you want to see what happens where there are none, ride down the riverside road in NJ (weehawken, Edgewater, etc). Take a look at the line of condos coming right up along the riverside, sans bike path, blocking view of the NYC skyline to all those in cars or in buildings lower than 4 stories behind them.

Also look at the new development that is building a 15 or so story residential structure whos one corner comes within 8 feet or so of the roadway.

We are getting a nice manmade canion there, the same as would have been built along the entire coastline of manhattan if they had not made SOME attempt at preventing this.

[Fabrizio]

MRoberts:

An aside: Down there somewhere is a thread (sorry I´m rushing and would post it) about what city could be considered "The Capital of the World" ( different I know, than "greatest" but...). You really should read the posts about London and how it continues to be great , surpassing NYC in many respects. The statistics are surprising. But it has never played the "worlds tallest building" race.

About China: China reforming? Don´t hold your breath. Will the Chinese language become the worlds international language as English (the language of London and NYC) is? Will it create culture.... music, film, theatre... that is able to speak to the entire world and that is truly influential? I could go on and on but the flashy skyscrapers of China or Arab countries or 3rd world countries is NOT going to be the factor in making their cities enjoy the greatness of a NYC or a London.

[Fabrizio]

Ablarc:

"MRoberts, see what you have done? Ask a simple question, and fifteen hours later, you have 33 answers.

Denial? You bet".


Ablarc: that´s snide. MRoberts has 33 answers because ... well that´s what a forum is about....discussion.

Denial? I think there have been some very valid, well expressed opinions here. To blithely pass them off as "denial" is awfully imperial.

[yyy]

It's a sad commentary on the state of architecture that size and quality are put as two opposing characteristics. Thankfully, I think your fears are misplaced. In Chicago, SOM's 7 Dearborn (does anyone have an image of it to upload?) would have been amazingly beautiful, and amazingly tall. Calatrava's propsed 2000-footer there is gorgeous well. Norman Foster's proposal for the WTC also was amazing. The problem is indeed that the same closed minded attitude in New Yorker's that pevents truly TALL buildings from being built also, in general, prevents truly GREAT buildings from being built as well.

As for room? Many of these cities are building these amazing buildings not in their central, developed cores but at the periphery. Who says we can't have the world's tallest building in Brooklyn or on the north shore of Staten island, or in Long Island City?

I don't put size and quality as opposing characteristics - I just say that size doesn't necessarily mean quality. I, personally, like tall buildings - they show power and achievement. But people compete who's going to build the tallest building instead of who's going to build the most beautiful and useful building - that's what I'm against.

And by the way, I totally agree that NYC should start building skyscrapers neighborhoods outside Manhattan. I'd be happy to see some skyscrapers in the Staten Island and Brooklyn.

[ablarc]

Fabrizio, what you think I said wasn't intended. I meant no link whatever between the first sentence of my post, which was intended purely as a good-natured salute to newbie MRoberts on the excellent and thought-provoking question he'd asked, and the stimulating discussion that ensued --to which you were a prime contributor.

The second sentence was meant to stand alone. I'm sure you can find plenty of denial in the thread, sometimes laced with sour grapes. I stand by that.

Nothing snide was intended. Let me apologize for being insufficiently alert for the potential misreading that actually took place. Must be more careful in future with my proofreading. It would also help if you were less anxious to find fault. :)

[MRoberts]

I don't know if building great skyscrapers make a city, but it certainly gets people's attention, and well, it does make them physically imposing, if nothing else. Kuala Lumpur put itself on the map that way. But, I do suggest that they may be a modern manifestation of a city's power and dynamism. Just a suggestion. Is New York's waning preemenince in this one very visible respect a manifestation of its waning preeminencein commerce, etc? Please, I am not saying it is not still great or very important today, only talking about very real, measurable trends in commerce, technogical development, corporate headquarter locations, etc.

I also think that Fabrizio is short-changing the Arabs and Asians in what they have to offer in terms of art and culture. And, you seem to be coming very close to saying it is impossible that NYC will be replaced as the world's no 1 city.

[lofter1]

Regarding a ciity maintaining it's top position, sometimes things change in wholey unexpected ways:

Don't forget about Lisbon. About 250 hundred years ago it was one of the grandest, most beautiful cities in the world -- and held a great share of power. All it took was 10 minutes of shaking from a series of the most devastating earthquakes in recorded history and the fate of Lisbon was altered forever (November 1, 1755).

NYC will fall from it's high place at some point as well -- hopefully at a time far into the future. But it will happen. It's the way the world goes.

[TomAuch]

NYC will inevitably fall from #1, but will do so when America as a whole falls behind to China, or the EU if they get their act together. It doesn't matter how many skyscrapers we build. I'm glad that the FT, BOA, NYT, and 80 South St. are going up, but their construction alone will not change NYC's fate.
2,500 years ago, Athens was at its peak until it was defeated by Sparta. Later on, "all roads led to Rome" until the empire fell to corruption and invasions by the Visigoths and the Huns. Baghdad was "the place to be" during the height of the Islamic Caliphite, until it was destroyed by the Mongols. Ditto for Toledo, Spain, Nanjing, China, and the Aztec capital Tenochtitlan, the artificial island (sounds familiar?) with a population bigger than 15th century Paris but without the sewage.

[Alonzo-ny]

Its stupid to think ny will never build tall again it just doesnt need to go massive just yet, i think in a few years something huge will spring up somewhere. The economy aint great right now and there are still huge buildings going up so how do you think it will be when the going getsd better. I agree that something big is going to go up on the westside, and theres always Mr. Trump

[pianoman11686]

Besides the EU statement, that's an excellent observation. Hegemony as the world's greatest civilization and/or city is cyclical, and there's no reason to think America/New York will stray from the historical trend. Although, I think it's worthwhile to point out that despite Britain's gradual decline since the beginning of the 20th century, when it controlled roughly 25% of the world's land and people, London has maintained its preeminent role as one of, if not the, greatest city, using a bunch of criteria that I don't feel like listing right now. Just from what I've read recently, the rank of world cities is, in order: London, New York, Tokyo, Paris. Those are the top four, and the step down to number five is a big one. I guess it's somewhat comforting to know that London and Paris have been top-tier cities for centuries and continue to excel despite the greatest competition ever. It makes me feel that New York has a long way to go before it begins its decline, and it definitely is on the rise. As for building tall, it's all about economics, as many have mentioned. I think what's happening now is a little annoying for some people, albeit necessary, for New York to become ever more desirable as a place to live and do business in. Real estate is the driving force for the city's coffers, and the more money it has to spend on various improvements, the better the quality of life will be. And no, I can't begin to imagine New York becoming cheaper at any point in the future. That's not a bad thing, with London being proof of that.

[Ninjahedge]

I don't know if building great skyscrapers make a city, but it certainly gets people's attention, and well, it does make them physically imposing, if nothing else. Kuala Lumpur put itself on the map that way. But, I do suggest that they may be a modern manifestation of a city's power and dynamism. Just a suggestion. Is New York's waning preemenince in this one very visible respect a manifestation of its waning preeminencein commerce, etc? Please, I am not saying it is not still great or very important today, only talking about very real, measurable trends in commerce, technogical development, corporate headquarter locations, etc.

I also think that Fabrizio is short-changing the Arabs and Asians in what they have to offer in terms of art and culture. And, you seem to be coming very close to saying it is impossible that NYC will be replaced as the world's no 1 city.

It is not that they do not have anything to offer, it is that they seem to be less willing to accept others.

The US is the great mixing bowl, it never truly melts everyone together. But it is very accepting of whatever croutons you put in the salad.

China prohibiting its own pople to see anything it does not approve of, and similar doctrines of class and sexist culture in the Arab world do not point to a good axis for cultural development.

Aslo, as pointed out, the buildings attract attension, but they do not indicate any sort of preeminence. NYC was built from the inside, with quite a few rocky periods in between. These places seem to be built and hope oneday to HAVE an inside.

NYC will not be the world capital forever, but the production of purely tall buildings is not an accurate barometer of the cultural weather.

[JCMAN320]

Yeah NYC may fall behind in skyscrapers, but it will never lag in culture and is which makes this city one of the great world cities. No one has the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, Brooklyn Bridge, Federal Hall, Wall St, Time Sq, Central Park. Also the geography here is unique, other cities may be on the side of lakes or rivers, but no city has a central island surrounded by its outer boundraies and water ways. Geography is destiny and NY's harbor is what made this city competitive and succesful to begin with. The skyscrapers followed with the ports, banks, insurance companies, etc.... All cities fall and rise in rankings, it is just the way the world works and evolves but NY will never stay down forever and will eventually build in it's surrounding territories and rise again to the top of the heap.

[TomAuch]

Yeah NYC may fall behind in skyscrapers, but it will never lag in culture and is which makes this city one of the great world cities. No one has the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, Brooklyn Bridge, Federal Hall, Wall St, Time Sq, Central Park. Also the geography here is unique, other cities may be on the side of lakes or rivers, but no city has a central island surrounded by its outer boundraies and water ways. Geography is destiny and NY's harbor is what made this city competitive and succesful to begin with. The skyscrapers followed with the ports, banks, insurance companies, etc.... All cities fall and rise in rankings, it is just the way the world works and evolves but NY will never stay down forever and will eventually build in it's surrounding territories and rise again to the top of the heap.

On the plus side, if Manhattan gets built out for tall buildings, then perhaps Brooklyn, Long Island City, and Jersey City could take over. I would love to be able to see world class skylines on each side of the Hudson and East Rivers.
However, NYC will do just fine, regardless of how tall its skyscrapers are in a generation from now. Besides, who the hell wants to go to Kuala Lampur or Shanghai? They may be doing well, but I doubt that they will ever have the world class appeal of NYC.

[bkmonkey]

According to Wikipedia, New York still has the majorty of skyscrapers that are 50 storyes and above in the world. While many cities build these skyscrapers for asthetics, they often fail to attract cliente. New York has built skyscrapers, but our skyscrapers, are built to attract buisness, not take up space. New York is considered the skyscraper capital of the world, because its thousands of skyscrapers are in such close proximity. I also hate to point out, that this study is flawed, it ranks Chicago above NYC in terms of skycrapers (which is ridiculous). They slammed new york for the loss of the WTC complex, and ignore the bigger one being built. They do not take into account the huge projects taking place around the city, while baseing the rannkings of other cities almost exclusivly on planned and under construction projects. They also compare New York to cities that are much larger in terms of landpace. This hurts nyc, because Jersey City and Newark are in relitivly close proximity to manhattan, while Shanghi, covers an enormus space. The numerous skycrapers in Jersey city and Newark are not counted in NYCs favor. When they claimed NYC was after Chicago, it destroyed their credibility, the study is quite flawed. The New York metro area, is still the greatest in terms of skycrapers.

[elfgam]

I think that London is a great example for what New York could be as the USA inevitably shifts from being the numero uno superpower to being an economic giant among many (EU, China, India, etc.). Even though the British Empire has long been eclipsed, London is now the most sought after adress in the world (along with NY). It's no accident that the rich and powerful of every country from China to India to Europe to Africa to Russia (and our own Madonna, for shame!) choose to maintain homes, if not their entire lives in London. London, equally to New York, is the pre-eminent world city for media, culture, finanance, architecture (both projects and the location of firms), and is the socio-political heart of Europe (no matter what the french say).

This all happened to London in the 1990s, after going through some serious duldrums in the late 70s and 80s, made most manifest when Prince Charles was able to declare invalid the winning entry to the National Gallery museum competition, which was a modern scheme, and insisted on a neo-classical recreation by Venturi. Londoners woke up to realize that their city was the laughing-stock of Europe with horrible food. All the great fahsion houses had died, British industry was in shambles, the big british banks were in trouble, the city's infrastructure was falling apart, and few good new buildings had been built since the 40s. The city was fragmented politically and socially.

What did they do? They reinvented themselves and fifteen years later look at them. Hopefully New York won't have to go down as low as they did -- and if we look around now I think we can see the spirit of re-invention fully at work here. NYC is the creative and socio-economic engine of the world -- if we continue to re-invent what this means, we'll be just fine.

[MRoberts]

In response to BLMonkey: No site that I know of rates NYC as number one with its skyline anymore; Not Emporis, not Best Skylines, and of course, not Ultrapolisproject. Note that ultrapolis says "Tallest" not "greatest" which is a bit more subjective. You say New York is "slammed" for losing the WTC. All they did was point out how the loss of the WTC affected the rankings. If anything, the site seems positively regretful about that. You also take fault with it because it doesn't take into account buildings that are not built yet. The site clearly says "as of the end of 2004." All cities are compared under the same standard. Finally, the accompanying article actually pays homage to NYC, and points out that NYC is still number one in terms of how many true skyscrapers it has, as compared to other cities. NYC is not being slammed by anybody. We arec just talking about the facts on the ground, and what they might mean.

[MRoberts]

bkmonkey, my apology for misspelling your username.

[BrooklynRider]

What is the mathematical equation for calculating the "tallest" and / or "greatest" city?

How do each of those sites develop their ratings?

[Ninjahedge]

I think they do it by "tallest" and "newest"

Two very unsubstantial delimiters for "greatest".

[Dynamicdezzy]

I apologize if this was mentioned already ( I didn't feel like reading the whole thread....lazy) But one major reason why things don't get built like they used to (the rate that everyone else is building now) is because of money. It costs a $hit load more to pay union workers for a project and it also takes longer. I'm pretty sure the majority of these asian cities or even arab cities do not pay that high for their labor. Besides NYC doesn't build to have half empty towers but rather build on demand for office space. If more business comes then more buildings will rise. Its as simple as that. I didnt think it was that hard to understand?

[Alonzo-ny]

NY will build big again when the time is right. When shanghai realises how much surplus office space it has its not going to need any more for about 50 years. I agree that no one wants to go to kuala lumpur just because of the towers there, i have a friend from there and he says right next to the towers are ghettos. The same for taipei, almost no one i know has heard of it and if i ask them the name of taiwans capital they dont know. I takes alot more than a couple of big buildings to create a great city. Also i think this thread is immensely of topic as it was to talk about ny and its skyscraper future not the world most cultural city. On that topic though London is a good comparison as its still one of the greatest cities in the world along with ny tokyo and paris and i think ny will always be one of the greatest. What would be the next best city as someone mentioned there is a big drop between 4 and 5

[MRoberts]

What is the mathematical equation for calculating the "tallest" and / or "greatest" city?

How do each of those sites develop their ratings?

Each site usualy tells you something about how they decided to do it. For example, a site that features "the Best Skylines" (easier to Google it than to give you their convoluted url) says they measure all of a city's buildings above 90 meters (about 25 stories). This seems to measure breadth as much as height, and ranks high those cities with many buildings, as opposed to cities with the tallest. Then again, they don't say "tallest skylines." The ultrapolis site says they looked at the ten tallest towers and buildings of each city, and through some calculation giving less value to spires and towers, came up with an average height (they don't give too much detail, though). Emporis also has one, and they explain theirs also; but theirs also seems to give even more weight to breadth.

[BrooklynRider]

Is there an accurate way and / or source to determine all buildings over 25 stories in every city? How would a person do that in NYC - or more specifically how would these sites have determined this?

[jiw40]

Hey,Dynamicdezzy,you have no idea what you're talking about.Union jobs go up MUCH faster than SCAB jobs.The reason buildings cost what they do is determined by many factors,not the least of which is the General Contractors profit.Come back to talk about job productivity,completion dates,and who profits most on a job when you have some accurate information.PS did you ever stop to think that if it was so costly and unprofitable to build than why do banks and other investors keep shoveling money into it?

[MRoberts]

Is there an accurate way and / or source to determine all buildings over 25 stories in every city? How would a person do that in NYC - or more specifically how would these sites have determined this?

Actually, until skyscraperpage.com put online an incredible catalog of what seems to be all high rises in all major cities of the world, this would have been very difficult, except for North American cities, which have been meticulously cataloged in almanacs for decades. So, that data is now online, though anyone doing any kind of study needs to be sure and verify what they can with a second source (errors do show up).

[Dynamicdezzy]

I apologize if i made my answer seem that way. I didnt mean to say (thats if i did) that it wasn't profitable. I was just saying that in certain places (like here) it would cost more to construct a tower in comparison to other locations where steel might be cheaper. While Mexico's labor is alot cheaper than the US', the steel prices are high. My response was leaning towards that. Again I apologize If i didn't elaborate and was way off from making myself clear. I didnt think anyone here would be so anal for a complete broken down response. ....and if I'm wrong, I stand corrected.

[BrooklynRider]

Union Labor on huge jobs can keep things moving - IF THEY WANT. But they do drive prices up and they can and do HOLD THINGS UP when it suits their agenda.

And, not all unions are equal. Explain to me all the teamster jobs that are "required" by collective bargaining, but only require that a teamster be "on site" as opppsed to fulfilling a building need.

Labor has its attributes, but it needs to be reformed to reflect the real world. For instance, most people constribute signficantly to medical insurance and have vacation periods from 2 weeks to 4 weeks per year.

I think unions are important in this country but they need major reform to connect in anyway with non-union workers (as opposed to non-union labor). I will add that my brother-in-law works in construction and was in an "unnamed" union for a little over a year. He is a meticulous and industroius worker and was called to the side on numerous occasions by shop stewards and other workers who complained that he was "making everyone look bad by working so hard and so fast". He now runs his own very successful company and will not use union labor.

For a union worker, the incentive is to finish the job professionally and to code - but necessarily as quickly as possible.

[bkmonkey]

My point was,
1) New York definatly has more skycrpaers than chicago, according to Emporis, NYC has more than 5,000 high rises, while Chicago has little more than 1000. However, your sight list Chicago as above New York in terms of skycrapers. That is simply not true.

2) New York City is listed as #1 before the loss of the world trade center complex. I just pointed out that the complex is being rebuilt with even taller buildings than before. In addition, the new buildings built in nyc since 2001 would more than compensate for the hieght of the WTC

4) New York City is compared with cities such as Shangi which are much bigger. The NYC metro area extends far beyond the bounderies of the city proper. Many of these cities have skycrapers that are far apart from each other, because these cities have a greater share of their metro area than nyc does. However Jersey City is undoubtablly part of the New York City Skyline, and Newark is farily close. They should be counted as part of the NYC skyline, as much new development will be taking place in Jersey City over the next few years. New York's skycraper count will never be accurate until this is done, and overall NYC will be much higher in the ranking. Fix these problems, and I will belive the survey, however the flaws remain. In addition, NYC is ranked number two according to Emporis, while It is rankied fourth according to your sight.

[jiw40]

No,you said it costs more to build and takes longer because of union labor,and that's exactly what you meant.You made no mention of cost of materials.I also "broke down" some items for your information,not because I have an "anal" need for it as you suggest.It has become apparent that you have no idea what you're talking about,other than hearsay and isolated instances of "do you know how much union guys make?"and "they MAKE a job last longer."Again,come back for this type of discussion when you have more information,possibly even first hand knowledge,of how a major construction job proceeds.

[kliq6]

NY is not done with Skyscrapers, a stupid thread

[Dynamicdezzy]

Well I was more or less leaning to what BKrider was saying. You are right about hearsay. I've had a couple of friends that have been in construction for years (and it might have been an exception to them or their business) but some of the conditions within their contracts allowed for much longer deadline. (I guess one of the reasons why Trump said he could get the UN done at a cheaper price and a much shorter time period). (honestly) sorry for the shots. If I'm uninformed well then let me go do my research. Lets drop it, it gets annoying when the topic turns from informative to 2 individuals throwing meaningless shots at one another with no progress. Thanks.

[Ninjahedge]

I will add that my brother-in-law works in construction and was in an "unnamed" union for a little over a year. He is a meticulous and industroius worker and was called to the side on numerous occasions by shop stewards and other workers who complained that he was "making everyone look bad by working so hard and so fast". He now runs his own very successful company and will not use union labor.

My father was in a similar situation. He is/was a Plumber. He had problems with the pipefitters because he was doing his job too quickly. They used to park eqipment in front of access so that he could not get to his work for the day.

Nice, eh?


Also, My mother is in the teachers union. She works her BUTT off every day to provide the students whatthey need, but for every teacher that does 110%, there is at least one that is slinking by with the barest minimum.

It annoys the hell out of me whenever someone says the "Teachers union" as if it was poison, but at the same time I can see teh abuse of the system that some of its members practice and get away with.


I guess the key thing here is t not only find the union labor, but a shop that does GOOD WORK. And as for some of the requirements, like having a guy around whose sole dute is to be the unions representitive on the job even though his profession is not used, that is simply a waste of capitol.


As for all this stuff about the sites measuring the skylines, this is getting rediculous. If you wanted to massage numbers like that, all you have to do is adjust the "minimum" height of a building for it to be considered a high rise.

You could also do the % occupancy of said towers to see which are the best TRUE expressions of a city, and which are simply the shells.

[NY_Yankees_1979]

Is it really that important to have such a tall building? NYC has several buildings that would be the tallest building in say Detroit, Philly, Boston, Houston, St. Louis, Minneapolis, Seattle, San Fransisco, Los Angeles and others. I don't really think that building tall is that important when you consider that NYC has the largest downtown area in the United States as far as area goes.

[jiw40]

Agreed.But I just want whoever makes a statement that is seemingly or actually anti-union to be informed and not judgmental based on rumors and "what I heard".I appreciate your taking a step in that direction.I've been a union ironworker for 19 years,and believe me I know labor unions are not infallible,but things are much better with them than without.We want jobs to go well too,performance is what we sell,but we certainly don't shoulder the responsibility for total job costs rising.Thanks for listening to my side of it,and if you have questions about a job we're usually willing to inform people about what we're doing.

[Alonzo-ny]

Agreed it is a stupid thread. I dont think there is any accurate way of deciding the best skyline. Chicago may have more taller buildings but ny has way more overall. Hong Kong also has many buildings but a large percentage of them are those project like high rises that everyone lives in over there. Also a skyline like ny is much different from hong kongs as hong kong has a mountain behind it which looks very dramatic but i cant have those awesome views ny has when the sun goes down and also ny is the only one with huge pre-war buildings which are beautiful. All in all all the skylines look good in there differnet ways but new york is clearly the best end of story end of thread, thank you, good night.

[MRoberts]

My point was,
1) New York definatly has more skycrpaers than chicago, according to Emporis, NYC has more than 5,000 high rises, while Chicago has little more than 1000. However, your sight list Chicago as above New York in terms of skycrapers. That is simply not true.

2) New York City is listed as #1 before the loss of the world trade center complex. I just pointed out that the complex is being rebuilt with even taller buildings than before. In addition, the new buildings built in nyc since 2001 would more than compensate for the hieght of the WTC

4) New York City is compared with cities such as Shangi which are much bigger. The NYC metro area extends far beyond the bounderies of the city proper. Many of these cities have skycrapers that are far apart from each other, because these cities have a greater share of their metro area than nyc does. However Jersey City is undoubtablly part of the New York City Skyline, and Newark is farily close. They should be counted as part of the NYC skyline, as much new development will be taking place in Jersey City over the next few years. New York's skycraper count will never be accurate until this is done, and overall NYC will be much higher in the ranking. Fix these problems, and I will belive the survey, however the flaws remain. In addition, NYC is ranked number two according to Emporis, while It is rankied fourth according to your sight.

I'll try this one more time:
1) We're talking tallest, not how many, which is why I agree with the Ultrapolis site. Besides, the Emporis site itself says it is ranking according to "visual impact." As such, I agree with their rankings.

2) Nobody counts buildings that are not built yet. And, if they did, NYC would actually rank lower because other cities are planning even more, taller buildings.

3) Shanghai and Hong Kong occupy less space than NYC, which means they packed more tall buildings in less area.

Finally, I think this thread has run its course. I've learned what I came here for on what New Yorkers think on these changes, and many of those who understood and responded to the original question appear to have left. So, I leave by quoting from the article that provoked this thread in the first place:
"One can easily imagine most typical adult Londoners at the turn of the last century, living in the great heart of the British Empire, going about their daily business, unaware of the great changes that would engulf their children in their adult lives;changes that would wrest from their shoulders the mantle of world power and leadership, and place it in the hands of others far east across the ocean. It is difficult to imagine, let alone comprehend, a world other than the one we know. But, whether we comprehend or not, the forces of human history will not stop.
Everything we do, every choice we make, says something about who and what we are; it says something about what we value. Just as the new records being set regularly in New York City in the early decades of the twentieth century signaled not only the rise of the world's greatest city, but also the world's greatest power, the United States of America, so too, it is telling where the new records are being set today. We can ignore these developments, or be impressed by them. But, we cannot escape the consequence of their meaning."
"http://ultrapolisproject.com/ultrapolis_016.htm

[pianoman11686]

Okay, having heard enough of the back and forth arguing about land areas, I decided to spend a meager five minutes of my time and look them up at Encarta. These are the land areas of the cities proper (not including metro areas):

New York = 786 sq km

Hong Kong = 1,092 sq km

And this is what they had to say about Shanghai: "Shanghai is an independently administered municipal district of 6,341 sq km (2,448 sq mi). It includes 3 counties and 17 urban districts of the city proper. The urban districts cover 2,057 sq km (794 sq mi), of which about 300 sq km (about 116 sq mi) is built-up and densely populated."

I hope this clears up a few things.

[Jeffreyny]

Bloomberg, NY Times Tower, BoA, Freedom Tower, Beekman Place, 80 South Street.

While some of these are spetacular buildings, none of them achieve the excitment and mystic of even say the Trump Building in Chicago.
Nothing over 1000 ft. in New York in a long time. Bloomberg, NY Times w/out antenna, Beekman Pl. and Bank America all under 1000 ft. The Freedom Tower is the only one that will actually sore over the existing skyline but it won't be any higher than the original Twin Towers in all reality.
New York has some impressively stunning buildings but nothing that soars into the rather leveled midtown skyline.
Sure there are more important things than having the tallest building in the world and New York need not even try to compete for that rather trivial skyscaper battle since it's already a world class city on so many other levels but some buildings to create excitment among those of us who don't follow forums like this might be nice.
Yes...it's time to put New York back on the skyscraper map!

[ablarc]

These are the land areas of the cities proper (not including metro areas):

New York = 786 sq km

Hong Kong = 1,092 sq km

And this is what they had to say about Shanghai: "Shanghai is an independently administered municipal district of 6,341 sq km (2,448 sq mi). It includes 3 counties and 17 urban districts of the city proper. The urban districts cover 2,057 sq km (794 sq mi), of which about 300 sq km (about 116 sq mi) is built-up and densely populated."

I hope this clears up a few things.
Sorry, but it doesn't, pianoman. Apples to oranges.

That Hong Kong figure includes the New Territories, where you'll find duck farms.

Anyway, what were you hoping to clear up?

* * *

MRoberts, I think I sense your dismay.

[PHLguy]

No one knows the answer, there are far too many hurdles for new york to build a skyscraper. Look at FT, and the lawsuit, we can kiss that building goodbye. But yes, new york is a big city with lots of demand so of course many 900 footers will hopefully be built, NY will never see a WTB or something the height of the trade towers again but it really doesn't need to when you think about it. Dubai just thinks it's hot shit, NY and Chicago blow it away. New york can be a very dissapointing city I will agree, because it moves slow.

[RJW]

Is it really that important to have such a tall building? NYC has several buildings that would be the tallest building in say Detroit, Philly, Boston, Houston, St. Louis, Minneapolis, Seattle, San Fransisco, Los Angeles and others. I don't really think that building tall is that important when you consider that NYC has the largest downtown area in the United States as far as area goes.

A large land mass is no substitute for a dynamic skyline and the most important element thereof is contrast (something only structures taller than their surroundings can deliver). If you look at old prewar pictures of downtown you see a breathtaking skyline that is now lost to the gradual lessening of contrast (plateaus make poor skylines).

[bkmonkey]

No one knows the answer, there are far too many hurdles for new york to build a skyscraper. Look at FT, and the lawsuit, we can kiss that building goodbye. But yes, new york is a big city with lots of demand so of course many 900 footers will hopefully be built, NY will never see a WTB or something the height of the trade towers again but it really doesn't need to when you think about it. Dubai just thinks it's hot shit, NY and Chicago blow it away. New york can be a very dissapointing city I will agree, because it moves slow.

I dissagree, the Freedom tower will be built on schedule, there is way to much riding on that. NYC is just going through a phase. ( Just as it did when it tore down the old Penn Station). The reason why Beekman tower (taller than 1000 feet) and 80 south street (taller than 1000 feet) as well as BOA (pretty tall) Miss Brooklyn (pretty tall), the new WTC complex ( entire new downtown area) dont generate much excitment, is because NYC is full of skycrapers. New High rises are built all the time. People are not generally excited by skycrapers as much as they were in the early part of the century. Once this phase of projects is complete, it's quite possible that it will usher in a new era of building, and anti-nimbyism. These huge projects will create quite a bit of precedent.

[ddny]

I don't think NYC is done with skyscrapers yet, but I think NYC has a lot of catching up with good quality architecture.

NYC is sorely behind in terms of the quality of skyscraper design and architecture in general when compared to other world cities.

I hope NYC will follow the footsteps of London, which in my opinion, is designing the best skyscrapers in the world right now. London is on the skyscraper map not because of 1000 footers, but because of the designs of the skyscrapers that are being built or proposed.

I think Hearst Tower and 80 South Street are good buildings for NYC, but the majority of the bunch (e.g. Random House Tower, Time Warner Center, Bear Stearns, Goldman Sachs, etc.) don't really have much to offer.

[PHLguy]

what I think what the title meant was height^


Not sure though.

[RJW]

No one knows the answer, there are far too many hurdles for new york to build a skyscraper. Look at FT, and the lawsuit, we can kiss that building goodbye. But yes, new york is a big city with lots of demand so of course many 900 footers will hopefully be built, NY will never see a WTB or something the height of the trade towers again but it really doesn't need to when you think about it. Dubai just thinks it's hot shit, NY and Chicago blow it away. New york can be a very dissapointing city I will agree, because it moves slow.

So much doom and gloom is completely unwarranted in consideration of the amount (and type) of building activity New York City has seen in the last 380 years. There is just no enduring reason for New York not to see WTC building heights and above again. That mode of thinking is contrary to the American spirit and certainly not representational of New York's (skyscrapers are our heritage). I think the building of superstructures in other parts of the world only help such prospects. Our planet is becoming an incredibly small place and the march forward for all of us should no longer be characterized as a zero sum game.

[bkmonkey]

New York Architecture is very corporate and no nonsense. Think about the old WTC. Its not that nyc is behid the times, its that nyc has its old style.

NYC has many more skycrapers that Chicago, whoever says differently is wrong

The nyc skyline should include Jersey city and perhaps Newark. There are certain points where the Goldman Tower looks like its in manhattan. (looking down west end avenue) It is definatly part of the harbor.

[PHLguy]

NYC has more skyscrapers but chicago is better porportioned, and taller. I love NY but when I look at the skyline driving on the jersey turnpike by the oil refineries all I see is a big clump of 750 foot buildings and the ESB, of cousre the city is far better looking from other angles, such as from queens, I think it blows Chi away from there, but it all depends on where you look at it.

[PHLguy]

So much doom and gloom is completely unwarranted in consideration of the amount (and type) of building activity New York City has seen in the last 380 years. There is just no enduring reason for New York not to see WTC building heights and above again. That mode of thinking is contrary to the American spirit and certainly not representational of New York's (skyscrapers are our heritage). I think the building of superstructures in other parts of the world only help such prospects. Our planet is becoming an incredibly small place and the march forward for all of us should no longer be characterized as a zero sum game.



I'm not trying to be a downer, I'm trying to be realistic.


Reasons buildings will never hit the height of the WTC again in NY (and I do hope I'm wrong)

1. NIMBYS, NY has a shitload of them, and they shorten alot of buildings! (except of corse for ghery tower which ironically the NIMBYS made taller, which tickles me inside. but we'll have to see if it will even get built)

2. Zoning laws. Along with San Francisco NY has some of the strictest zoning laws in the nation.

3. Fear, Fear of terrorism is not over.

4. New Yorkers don't really care about skyscrapers when you look at a broad spectrum. Most aren't Nimbys but most aren't "Yimbys" like us either.

5. Economic. It is not profitable to build towers over 60-70 floors, NY is all about money, Dubai is all about ego.

[RJW]

I'm not trying to be a downer, I'm trying to be realistic.


1. NIMBYS can be broken.
2. Zoning laws can be changed.
3. Terrorism has not stopped the Freedom Tower (hate that name) from getting to 1400 feet or the proposal of a 2000 foot (residential!) tower in Chicago (not NY, I know, but its not exactly a foreign country either).
4. Most New Yorkers never cared about skyscrapers (or even who is President judging by voting statistics) - super skyscrapers are the product of dreamers and ego.
5. Not profitable - I read this a lot - it's the gospel of anti-development leftist NIMBYS - so I refer you to number 4 (super skyscrapers are the product of dreamers and ego) - NIMBYS know it - that’s why they embrace zoning laws (after all, it can't be their concern that a developer might lose his shirt).

[pianoman11686]

PHLguy:

Firstly, part of the reason the skyline doesn't look that great from the turnpike is because there is a huge cliff that stretches for several miles along the Hudson River, and from certain angles, it actually cuts off the view of the bottom half of Manhattan's skyline. As you approach the Lincoln Tunnel on 495, and finally clear the hill when the "helix" begins, the impact is truly stunning, and there is plenty of height to marvel at. It'll only get better as the Hudson Yards area fills in, and surrounding buildings like NY Times and BOA extend corporate Midtown westward.

Secondly, even despite the cliff and the "plateau effect", there is a certain astonishment that most people experience when they first see the skyline from the turnpike, for the simple reason that it stretches on and on and on. Most skylines are defined by 5-10 tall buildings; Manhattan's appears to stretch as far as the eye can see. Most people who have never seen New York in person must wonder, "Wow, is it really that big?" This, I think, is much more awesome than seeing one or two supertalls piercing the sky within a few blocks of each other.

Thirdly, how can you even begin to predict the future? You have no idea what the economy will look like in 5-10 years, locally or nationally. Right now, New York is being fueled by residential development, which results in a lot of 20-30 story buildings. Don't think that there will always be enough room for these. Sure, it costs to build tall, but Manhattan has very finite space, and eventually, residentials will have to go much taller. We're already seeing the beginnings of this at the Con Ed site.

You lament the existence of NIMBY's. Sure, they can be a pain, but the type of construction that will most likely yield the tallest buildings is commercial. The core of Midtown has very few residents, thus there's no reason to expect NIMBY's to oppose commercial supertalls there. Right now, residential construction is the rave. We might well see a period of corporate growth which will result in higher demand for capital and employees, both of which need to be housed in new buildings.

You point out our strict zoning laws. Bloomberg has rezoned more land in the city than any mayor in recent memory. There's no reason to think that he'll stop this habit any time soon. Plus, incentives that often accompany rezonings will make places like the Far West Side a hotbed of development.

You highlight fear of terrorism, yet most people know that the likelihood of another aerial attack is minimal. Terrorists will look to disrupt every day life through mass transit bombings (for the most part) and some will try to detonate biological, chemical, or nuclear weapons. It doesn't matter how tall your building is in that scenario. It's not a target. The city is. And come to think of it, you'd probably be safest in a tall, modern building with excellent ventilation. The fact that people are coming to New York in droves to live, and companies are also starting to return, signals that "fear" does not affect their conscious decision to live/work in the city.

You point out that most New Yorkers don't care about skyscrapers. I've got a news flash for you. Most, if not all developers, don't care that New Yorkers don't care! They design buildings for specific clients - people or businesses - that are looking for apartments or offices. The more demand, the more construction we'll see.

So, don't get your hopes down. And don't try to get everyone else's hopes down either. There's no way you can prove that your scenario will play out, and mine won't.

[BrooklynRider]

Well, that pretty well sums it up.

[ddny]

New York Architecture is very corporate and no nonsense. Think about the old WTC. Its not that nyc is behid the times, its that nyc has its old style.

London still has it's old style too, but its new architecture is very forward looking. It should be the same with New York.

[RJW]

London still has it's old style too, but its new architecture is very forward looking. It should be the same with New York.

I agree but like to think that things are headed, at least, in the right direction. Conde Nast, NY Times, Time Warner, Bank of America, Hearst, Altantic Yards, Calatrava (transit and 80 south), the Meier condos, even 7 WTC - all these developments are of so much better quality and in some cases forward looking than what we were getting in the 70's, 80's and 90's.

[Ninjahedge]

OK, this is stupid.

Chicago Skyline (copyright Richard Seamen)
http://www.richard-seaman.com/USA/Cities/Chicago/Landmarks/ChicagoSkyline.jpg

Looks like downtown NYC. Not midtown, not anywhere else.

NYC Skyline (JUST Midtown)
http://www.kconnors.com/albums/NYC/skyline.sized.jpg

Shanghai, while diverse, is TINY!
http://image.guardian.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/arts/2004/11/08/chung_shanghai3.jpg

Hong Kong.

Looks a LOT like NYC except for two things.

1. The mountain in the background.
2. The buildings, although about the same size, are more modern in design and construction.

http://my.tdctrade.com/photolib/hk/1100003L.jpg

So please cut it out with this juvenile argument about how "NYC is entering its decline just like the fall of Rome" and "They do not want to build any TALL buildings".

i hate to tell you, but anything above 10 stories is big. 10-30 is a mid-rise. 30-about 50 is a HIGH rise, and above that is a skyscraper, although the two have been used interchangeably depending on where it is.

They have a thread on this here: http://www.fortwortharchitecture.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=531

Where the definition is more based on building function than actual height.

So anyone that goes out and looks at a 500 foot tall building and does not think it is a skyscraper just because there are a a dozen buildings that are above 1000ft needs to get their heads out of the sand. You are the same people that buy the bigger TV not because you can actually see anything more on it, but because it is BIGGER. :p


Tallest Buildings: (Sorry for the formatting.....And OK, so there are 25 buildings above 1000ft!)

Rank Building Year M Ft Stories
1 Taipei 101, Taipei, Taiwan 2004 508 1,668 101
2 Petronas Tower I, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia 1998 452 1,483 88
(tie) 2 Petronas Tower II, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia 1998 452 1,483 88
4 Sears Tower, Chicago (IL), United States 1974 442 1,450 110
5 Jin Mao Building, Shanghai, China 1998 421 1,380 88
6 Two International Finance Centre, Hong Kong, China 2003 412 1,352 88
7 CITIC Plaza, Guangzhou, China 1997 391 1,283 80
8 Shun Hing Square, Shenzhen, China 1996 384 1,260 69
9 Empire State Building, New York (NY), United States 1931 381 1,250 102
10 Central Plaza, Hong Kong, China 1992 374 1,227 78
11 Bank of China Tower, Hong Kong, China 1989 368 1,209 72
12 Emirates Office Tower, Dubai, United Arab Emirates 1999 355 1,165 55
13 T & C Tower, Kaohsiung, Taiwan 1997 347 1,140 85
14 Aon Center, Chicago (IL), United States 1973 346 1,136 80
15 The Center, Hong Kong, China 1998 346 1,135 73
16 John Hancock Center, Chicago (IL), United States 1967 344 1,127 100
17 Ryugyong Hotel, Pyongyang, North Korea 1995 330 1,083 105
18 Sky Tower, Auckland, New Zealand 1997 328 1,076 ?
19 Burj al Arab Hotel, Dubai, United Arab Emirates 1999 321 1,053 60
20 Chrysler Building, New York (NY), United States 1930 319 1,046 77
21 Bank of America Plaza, Atlanta (GA), United States 1993 312 1,023 55
22 U.S. Bank Tower, Los Angeles (CA), United States 1990 310 1,018 75
23 Telekom Malaysia Headquarters, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia 1999 310 1,017 55
24 Emirates Towers Hotel, Dubai, United Arab Emirates 2000 309 1,014 56
25 AT&T Corporate Center, Chicago (IL), United States 1989 307 1,007 60

[RJW]

I don’t think anyone is saying that a 750 foot building is not tall so much as lamenting the fact that buildings this height and lower do nothing but reinforce the monotonous plateau our city's skyline has become. As I stated earlier... The most important element of a dynamic skyline is contrast (something only structures taller than their surroundings can deliver). If you look at old prewar pictures of downtown you see a breathtaking skyline that is now lost to the gradual lessening of contrast (plateaus make poor skylines). It is an issue of relativity (not height per se) for if every building in New York were 1500 feet the problem would be the same.

[ablarc]

RJW nails it from an aesthetic standpoint; there's no arguing with the truth of what he says. You can belittle its importance, but you can't dispute the reality of the phenomenon.

[BrooklynRider]

I agree with RJW as well. Also, I think the Chicago picture is rather un representative of the city's "skyline". It is a picture of the Sears Tower - we all know the skyline there is a lot more impressive.

[TallGuy]

Every time I am in Chicago I enjoy looking at the Sears Tower because of its' height, and try to imagine other buildings next to it for comparison (ESB, WTC, FT, Petronas, etc). Other than that, I think it is one UGLY building with awful symmetry and grim black cladding. Thank god it is not marring NYC.

[Ninjahedge]

I agree with RJW as well. Also, I think the Chicago picture is rather un representative of the city's "skyline". It is a picture of the Sears Tower - we all know the skyline there is a lot more impressive.

Then just don't post there, do a google and find a better image man!

[kz1000ps]

Do we really need Brooklyn to Google an image of Chicago for us? And who here on this skyscraper forum is unaware of what Chicago looks like already? Seems kind of redundant in a community like this, Ninja. Like Brooklyn said, "we all know the skyline there is a lot more impressive."

But what the hey - who doesn't mind another good pic of a good skyline.

[Ninjahedge]

KZ, the point is, why spend time posting "Chicago looks better than that" rather than posting an image that gives a better view so that the arguement is either refuted or strengthened.

The only full skyline of Chicago I think I have ever seen was with Ferris Buelers Day Off, and I am sure I am not alone.

Sometimes people do not spend inordanate ammounts of time looking at skylines, or worse yet, arguing about them... ;)

[NewYorkYankee]

Which skyline is better is highly subjective, IMO. To each persons personal tastes and intrests.

[NoyokA]

RE: This Thread: Who cares?

NYC is the greatest city in the world, bar none.

A better comparrison would be in the number of square feet of office space, height is fickle, NYC is and will continue to be the financial capital of the world.

[kliq6]

Stern is right on. Pure SF and usage of buildings, it is unmatched. Alot of those large Far East buildings are half empty and dont offer as much space as youd think. there more sho wthen substance

[kz1000ps]

KZ, the point is, why spend time posting "Chicago looks better than that" rather than posting an image that gives a better view so that the arguement is either refuted or strengthened.

The only full skyline of Chicago I think I have ever seen was with Ferris Buelers Day Off, and I am sure I am not alone.

Sometimes people do not spend inordanate ammounts of time looking at skylines, or worse yet, arguing about them... ;)


I see what you're saying. You made an interesting point about the scarcity of full skyline pics. I searched my small personal collection with no luck, although I found this (more of an aerial than a skyline shot, and I certainly didn't take this photo).

http://img236.imageshack.us/img236/6056/chicago11dy.jpg (http://imageshack.us)


Also, I almost assume that everybody here drools over skyline/whatever photos, a lot. "Spend inordinate amounts of time" describes my online architectural habits quite well :)

[PHLguy]

Every time I am in Chicago I enjoy looking at the Sears Tower because of its' height, and try to imagine other buildings next to it for comparison (ESB, WTC, FT, Petronas, etc). Other than that, I think it is one UGLY building with awful symmetry and grim black cladding. Thank god it is not marring NYC.



It's not a handsome building, I don't think it's THAT bad, I think it's quite sleek. But to each his own opinion. I do agree that it is not nearly as attractive as JHC.


I just got back from Chicago an hour ago, visiting a college in Wisconsin. What a city, so relaxed and athsetically pleasing.

[lesterp4]

I am very familiar with Chicago. It does have a nice skyline. However, it is relatively long and narrow. Most buildings are along the lake front from 1600 N to 400 S. 20 blocks and for most of this stretch it is only 3 0r 4 blocks wide and these are 1/2 the width of midtown blocks. The widest area is probably the Loop and that would be from 100 E to 600W. It hardly comparable to Manhattan. All the very tall buildings are nestled on a very narrow strip of land along the lakefront.

[NYatKNIGHT]

With the exception of the WTC, which is a replacement, NYC has stopped building over 1000 feet. Not so in Chicago.

It doesn't necessarily mean Chicago has a better skyline than New York. Both are mind-blowing in their own way, but I prefer New York's variety of architecture and its incredible immensity. I don't like wishing, however, that New York had a few peaks of loftier towers that rose above the rest, like it used to, or like Chicago has now. It's not because tall buildings aren't being built anymore, it's because there's some barrier in New York lately, the same one that made Trump go to Chicago to have is tall tower built. Hopefully it is temporary, as some have suggested - to me that is the heart of the discussion of this thread: is New York done, or will it surge again?

Why ask 'who cares'? Isn't it obvious that this is a discussion board of mostly skyscraper fans? Besides, we ought to be able to take a little criticism about our own city, after all, that is one thing that sets New York apart from the rest, IMO. Believing we live in the most incredible city in the world, we are secure enough to acknowledge its flaws.

[PHLguy]

thank you^

Outside of the WTC, there is NOTHING over 1000 feet to the roof that will be built for all we know. And the WTC is uncertain itself with all these lawsuits and delays.

[elfgam]

I never realized just how flat chicago is outside of the downtown core... compare it to an aerial pic of NY and you will realize that it's comparing a grove of tree to a jungle...

[ASchwarz]

Chicago has a very small skyline. The city has fewer highrises than London, to say nothing of New York. Comparing the two is silly.

Who cares if Chicago or some third-rate Asian cities build ego-driven towers? Do you want to compare NY to Paris or Dubai?

If Rapid City, South Dakota builds a 1000 foot tower of popsicle sticks, I suppose it should then be crowned the greatest city in the world.

[TallGuy]

Exactly. So what if Dubai has a 2,400 foot needle? New York is a dynamic, ever changing city, and this is expressed in its' skyscrapers from Flatiron to the Art-Deco Chrysler, to the Seagrams style, to the ugly boxes and to BOA, NYT and TWC redevelopment. They all tell a linear story and must be taken in that context to be appreciated. Shanghai? What's to say they won't stop building in 10 years, and in 50years will have a dated, stagnant skyline? It's like an attractive woman: would you rather have natural 36C's or Silicon-inflated 40EE'S?

[PHLguy]

Chicago has a very small skyline. The city has fewer highrises than London, to say nothing of New York. Comparing the two is silly.

Who cares if Chicago or some third-rate Asian cities build ego-driven towers? Do you want to compare NY to Paris or Dubai?

If Rapid City, South Dakota builds a 1000 foot tower of popsicle sticks, I suppose it should then be crowned the greatest city in the world.



Chicago has a small skyline? Are you joking? Dude they have 90 buildings over 500 feet, Downtown Chicago is almost as big as midtown.


It's the 3rd largest skyline in the world actually.

[ASchwarz]

Chicago has a small skyline? Are you joking? Dude they have 90 buildings over 500 feet, Downtown Chicago is almost as big as midtown.


It's the 3rd largest skyline in the world actually.

Not sure what you're talking about. Go to skyscrapers.com and look at Chicago's totals. Chicago is light years from NYC in total number of skyscrapers. This doesn't even take into account that the site has every building in Chicago and is missing thousands of NYC buildings (including three I have lived in).

I'm not sure how you're measuring the "size" of downtown Chicago. Let's take office space. Chicago's core has 1/3 the office space of Midtown and less than 1/5 the office space of Manhattan overall. Let's take residential space. Chicago's densest neighborhoods are about half the density of Brooklyn or the Bronx, to say nothing of Manhattan.

Chicago has a small skyline. It has many tall towers (because of lax zoning and huge parking garage tower bases) but it doesn't even have as extensive a skyline as Toronto.

[PHLguy]

I'm talking about tall buildings not 10 story lowrises, those don't add to a skyline, they add to density.

[PHLguy]

Chicago has a small skyline. It has many tall towers (because of lax zoning and huge parking garage tower bases) but it doesn't even have as extensive a skyline as Toronto.



Chicago is one of the big three toronto rivals houston or dallas.

I'm not going to continue with this, sorry, let's get back on topic

[lesterp4]

I just checked the 2005 World Almanac. Chicago has 80 bldgs over 500 ft. , NYC has 170, Toronto has 13. Chicago had another 40 over 400. They didn't list NYC over 400 because there were too many.

[pianoman11686]

Downtown Chicago is almost as big as midtown.

Not even close. Before 9/11, Downtown Chicago wasn't even bigger than Lower Manhattan, which as we all know, is peanuts compared to Midtown. I've never been to Chicago. My mom went there for a business trip once a few years back. She worked on Broad Street in lower Manhattan at the time. Even then, she was surprised at how tiny Chicago felt. I'm not saying this amounts to a boring skyline, because Sears, John Hancock, Aon, and the Four Seasons Tower are all massive and exciting. But in terms of office space, density, overall coverage by tall buildings - not even close.

[PHLguy]

Im not saying chi is as big, I'm just saying it's not small, As I said before lets talk about something else.

[BrooklynRider]

Chicago is a very impressive city. Its skyline is beautiful because the buildings aren't built smack up against each other like New York. Anyone who has visited the city would find it difficult to deride the skyline or its architecture.

[Alonzo-ny]

This another never ending argument

[Ninjahedge]

No it isn't.

[Alonzo-ny]

Good one almost replied in anger there!

[TonyO]

Posted on SSP:

Financial Times
(news.ft.com)

High hopes

By Christopher Grimes
Published: September 15 2005 17:07 | Last updated: September 15 2005 17:07

Lord Foster, the renowned British architect, was in midtown Manhattan when the first reports came in that the World Trade Center was under attack. Foster was presenting his plans for a gleaming new steel and glass office tower to his clients - executives of the Hearst publishing company - but on hearing the news he naturally cut it short. He and Frank Bennack, then Hearst’s chief executive, retreated to a boardroom to watch the catastrophe unfold on television. Foster, unable to disregard his architect’s training, explained to Bennack what was happening to the structures as they weakened and collapsed.


In the mournful, confusing weeks that followed, Bennack and Foster were consumed with the question of whether to go ahead with their project. Had the world just witnessed the end of the skyscraper era? What kind of message would it send to build a big, bold office tower in Manhattan? Could New York spare the manpower to build their project, or would the city’s construction crews be needed for the colossal job of rebuilding lower Manhattan?

By November, Bennack had his answer: the Foster design would be built. Foster and Hearst officials took the design to the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission, which approved it unanimously - a rare event in the fractious world of New York development. Everyone on the commission knew the significance of Hearst’s decision to build: just weeks after terrorists had destroyed Manhattan’s most visible buildings, a major corporation was making a long-term commitment to a traumatised city.

Four years on, there is an architectural renaissance in New York that would have been difficult to imagine in the weeks that followed 9/11. Since the 1960s, the shape of New York’s skyline has been under the control of savvy developers who made fortunes erecting uniform brick apartment towers and boxy office buildings. Architects wanting to do something new had little choice but to look to Europe or Asia. This is changing: New York is once again becoming a city where adventurous architecture can happen. Many of the world’s top architects are, like Foster, working in the city for the first time.

The outbreak of adventurous design is extremely broad-based. There are public works, most spectacularly Santiago Calatrava’s design for a new transportation centre near the World Trade Center site. There are the midtown office towers: Foster’s Hearst building, Renzo Piano’s design for The New York Times and Cesar Pelli’s new office for Bloomberg LP, all departures from the corporate glass boxes that dominate midtown Manhattan. There are great new cultural designs, including Yoshio Tanaguchi’s elegant expansion of the Museum of Modern Art. Restorations include David Childs’ plan to convert the 1912 beaux-arts Farley Post Office into a desperately needed new Pennsylvania Station. And then there is the High Line, one of those priceless ideas that is often conceived but too rarely executed: the plan is to convert a 1.45-mile-long stretch of disused elevated train track into a public park 30 feet above Chelsea and the Meatpacking District. But perhaps the most heartening of all is the return to interesting residential design, spurred on by Richard Meier’s work on Manhattan’s west side.

I went first to Childs - whose firm Skidmore Owings Merrill has been a dominant force in the city’s architecture for 50 years - to find out why all of this is happening now. “There’s always something about the turn of the century that makes people begin to think about public spaces,” says Childs, who is lead architect of the Freedom Tower on the World Trade Center site. The great discussion about civic design started in the late 19th century in New York, and those concepts were incorporated in the building boom of the early 20th century. “It seems to me this is happening again,” Childs says. “It’s an energising moment.”

Kent Barwick, president of the Municipal Art Society, compares the mood in the city not to the early 1900s but to the period after the second world war. “There was an explosion of talent and a sense of optimism. It’s like that today.” New York in 1945 had the advantage of not having been blitzed, but today New Yorkers live with the knowledge that their city is a terrorist target. “One would have thought that in the aftermath of the destruction of lower Manhattan people would have been morose. That seems not to be the case,” he says. “The spirit of the city is very strong. Whether it holds up to rational analysis hardly matters. This is a cause for celebration.”

Though the terrorist threat is a legitimate reason for feeling uneasy about living in New York, it is also something that residents must put out of their heads in order to get out of bed each morning. The improved quality of life in the city - a result of years of lower crime rates - is more tangible. It is easier to feel optimistic about the city without the threat of encountering muggers, squeegee men or junkies. The residential housing boom - while hardly unique to New York - has been widespread for this reason. Yes, prices for Upper West Side apartments have risen dramatically in the past four years. But so have values on the Lower East Side and other neighbourhoods that were blighted by crime and neglect 10 or 15 years ago.

Despite fears of the bubble bursting, the housing boom has played an undeniable role in the city’s architectural renaissance. The old joke about architecture in New York is that form does not follow function - form follows finance. The powerful real estate developers who built most of the city’s housing in the 1970s and 1980s were known for their ability to navigate the city’s bureaucracy, not for their sense of style. They had no time for ambitious architects, who were viewed as prima donnas good for nothing but creating delays and added expense. Big stretches of Manhattan were transformed in this period - particularly on Third and Sixth Avenues, where rows of bland brick apartment buildings were built with great efficiency, but no panache.

Richard Meier’s elegant and slightly eccentric apartment buildings on Perry Street changed that. The minimalist 16-storey buildings, clad in laminated glass, are a perfect complement to the Hudson River, which they face. Built between 1999 and 2002, the Meier apartments sold quickly, and for millions, to celebrities such as Martha Stewart and Calvin Klein. Another Meier is being built on nearby Charles Street, and demand has also been strong. Developers have come to see a use for those fancy architects after all, with Calatrava, Frank Gehry, Zaha Hadid, Robert A.M. Stern, Charles Gwathmey and Michael Graves now designing residential buildings in Manhattan, while Meier is starting a project in Brooklyn.

”The very positive response to the two buildings we designed on Perry Street has led some developers to the realisation that good architecture can be profitable - and maybe more profitable than just banal buildings,” Meier says.

The result is that New York is edging back on to the international architectural stage after being perceived by the design community as a risk-averse, corporate city.

”There is certainly a shift,” says Michael Wurzel, a partner at Foster Partners, who is working on the Hearst project. “This can be observed by the number of foreign architects working in New York.” Wurzel, who is based in London, says, “New York always had bold and tall buildings, but in design terms it was not cutting-edge. In the design community it was a conservative place, difficult for architects. But I think this is changing.”

A strong force behind this change is mayor Michael Bloomberg’s administration, whose enthusiasm for public design paved the way for Christo’s Gates exhibit in Central Park this winter and the High Line project.

”It is probably the most visually sophisticated administration in the history of the city,” says Barwick of the Municipal Art Society. “They’re very conscious of good architecture, and they want to encourage it.” The mayor’s office has been working to remove some of the notorious red tape that enmeshes the planning and development process - including the monumental task of rewriting New York’s building code, last updated in 1968. The hope is to streamline construction, reduce costs and stimulate development. And Bloomberg’s planning commissioner, Amanda Burden, does not hide her desire to bury the complacency that had dominated development in the city. “If an architect wants to push the envelope, we will help them,” she says. “This is a time for innovation and design excellence. I push it as hard as I can.”

So can any of the city’s architectural re-birth be attributed to 9/11? The answer is yes, in two respects. First, the great public debate over the proposed designs for the World Trade Center site was perhaps the greatest architectural conversation ever. Given the often ugly back-and-forth over the redevelopment in the past 18 months, it is easy to forget the extraordinary public meeting that took place in the summer of 2002, when thousands of people rejected the original lacklustre proposals for the site. “It needs to be bolder,” they shouted, and they forced officials to hold a new design competition. The after-effects of that public conversation are still with us.

Second, some very high-quality designs have been proposed for the site still known as Ground Zero, despite a deeply flawed development process. (Rather than being a public works project, many of the key decisions are being made by a hard-nosed real estate developer.) Some of the world’s most talented architects - Calatrava, Gehry, Childs, Foster and Daniel Libeskind among them - are creating designs for Ground Zero that aim to symbolise the city’s resilience and rebirth. Even if politics or the vagaries of the real estate business prevent the project from living up to those goals, great architecture has already been reborn in New York.

[GVNY]

Absolutely fantastic article.

[Linus]

this may be a little late to reply to but i have to say something about the blue condo being built directly across the narrow street of my 6 story apartment bldg. it basically sucks on so many levels. forget the fact that i went to architecture school and think the design is ridiculous. forget the fact that it's going to cost an estimated $1350 per square foot to live in it (about the same as a tribeca apt with a view). or that it's killing the only part of manhattan that's still cool. the reason i'm writing is b/c i just want everyone who is working on or is excited about this monster to know that they wake me up every morning with extrememly loud construction, are adding to the pollution that already plagues my street, and in a year any remaining sunlight that comes in through my bedroom window will be gone. thanks. how do we stop these bldgs from happening? anyone want to figure this out with me?

[ASchwarz]

Linus,

Move to Staten Island if you hate tall buildings. If you abhor density and tall buildings, then why did you choose to live in Manhattan? Even crazier, you picked an unusually trendy neighborhood experiencing tons of redevelopment and then complain about the construction.

[lofter1]

how do we stop these bldgs from happening? anyone want to figure this out with me?
You could work on getting your neighborhood designated as an historic district and / or landmark district; the building restrictions are much tougher.

Construction noise? I've lived in my place almost half my life and it seems that one building or another on my block is always having some noisy work done. And when they tore down the 4 story concrete garage across the street a couple of years back it was jack hammering from 6AM to 6PM for 6 months.

NYC is a place that has done nothing but change for 400 years. I was walking along Houston near Allen St. the other day and was amazed at the amount of construction in that area. Plus the entire area at the foot of the Manhattan side of the Williamsburg Bridge is probably going to be a very hot construction area within the next few years. And all the area between (basically the "new" LES) is going to go through major changes.

One way you can try to influence the changes that take place in your neighborhood:

Go to Community Board meetings (chances are yours is CB3): http://www.nyc.gov/html/cau/html/cb/cb_manhattan.shtml

[lofter1]

^ I forgot to add that you could buy up all the property in your immediate area. Then you would control what happens to it.

[BrooklynRider]

Maybe if you get away from your apartment for a little while and abandon the narcissistic predisposition to ask the world to focus solely on you, your needs and desires - you will find that life happens out THERE. Go visit Williamsburg. That is precisely what is going to happen in your neighborhood in coming years. And if you don't own your apartment outright, you might start preparing yourself for eviction when your building gets sold to an Avalon Chrystie or Extell for bigger development.

[ablarc]

Linus, BR's solution is right on the money.

Also I agree with ASchwartz that you should look into Staten Island.

[Alonzo-ny]

I found staten island to feel like another country from the rest of new york, i didnt enjoy the time i spent there.

[ablarc]

I found staten island to feel like another country from the rest of new york, i didnt enjoy the time i spent there.
The people who live there are said to love it.

I suspect most of them hate the rest of New York.

Periodically they speak of secession.

It should really be part of New Jersey. Maybe it could be traded for a strip that ran from Weehawken to Jersey City.

[evil_synth]

When do you think the World's tallest building will be in New York again? New York had it for 40+ years, but now taller skyscrapers are rising up left and rights. The Tower in Dubai is est. at 2300 ft. When will the race end, or is this just the beginning of an era when 1000ft+ buildings will become common place, thus leaving famous buildings like the empire state building (now 9th tallest in the world) just average height? What can be considered truely tall?

Sorry to derail the topic from New York trading Staten Island for Weehawken,

[ablarc]

When do you think the World's tallest building will be in New York again?
Never? NIMBYs.

Unless they put it on Staten Island; they could develop that like Dubai!

[Alonzo-ny]

I think never is a bad word, nimbys cant stop everything, with the right site, zoning etc someone could get it done. Lets just hope trump finds the site soon!

[Citytect]

If the Burj Dubai fulfills its promises of 2300+ ft. New York will probably never see the world's tallest again. I don't think the FAA would allow it.

[Alonzo-ny]

F the FAA. I think we will get some more huge buildings nut maybe not 2300ft for a while. Isnt about the top 100m spire anyway. Ive seen some elevations of it next to taipei 101 and it doesnt look unfesable to build higher.

[czsz]

F the FAA.

So you haven't had enough of planes crashing into skyscrapers in New York?

[ZippyTheChimp]

I think the general FAA imposed limit is 2000 ft. It is considerably lower along airport approaches.

[Alonzo-ny]

you know what i mean they can always re-route, i dont see a difference in danger of a plane hitting a 1400ft building and a 2000ft, if it can hit one it can hit the other

[ZippyTheChimp]

It's a big difference if the plane is at 1800 ft.

No, I don't know what you mean. I only know what you state.

Greenie stated that there would not be a building in NY the size of Burj Dubai because of FAA limitations.

You stated F the FAA.

I stated that the FAA limit in NY is 2000 ft (correct me if I'm wrong), and lower along airport approaches.

You stated that "they can always re-route."

You can't re-route glide paths, so I have no idea what you mean.

[Alonzo-ny]

As far as im aware no planes actually fly directly over manhattan at 1800ft so i dont believe the danger is significantly bigger than a plane hittin say esb than a 2000ft building

[ZippyTheChimp]

A 2000 foot TV tower proposed for Bayonne (we have a thread on the subject) was rejected by the FAA.

A 2300 ft tower in NYC would have to get a waiver from the FAA, which controls the airspace over the city.

If all air traffic over Manhattan never goes below 3000 ft, it does follow that any building height below 3000 ft is ok. Sorry to repeat, but the general rule that I know of for the metro area is nothing over 2000 ft. In certain areas, it is less than that.

[Alonzo-ny]

I would think current measures allow for it to be safe enough that a 2000ft+ building could be built without danger. The only risk would be to a very severe situation including unlike things like serious fog + radar failure + Instrument failure and maybe any other multiple failures in the plane that would result in a catastrophic accident, but as i said before in the event that did happen id say esb etc would be at the same risk.

[ablarc]

Do altimeters tell you height above sea level or height above prevailing grade? How does the FAA handle the fact that ground level in Denver is already at 5,000 feet elevation?

Could the FAA learn to think of very tall skyscrapers as geological formations?

[ZippyTheChimp]

Using the rationale that the ESB would be as much at risk as a 2000 ft building, we can state that a 1000 ft building is as much at risk as the ESB. Eventually, this argument would lead to the ultimate safe situation - no buildings, no city.

Obviously, that is not a practical solution. Regardless of what the odds are of an airplane hitting a building, those odds get lower as the building gets bigger. Apparently, the FAA has determined that above 2000 ft, the risk is unacceptable. So that's the rule, and if you want a waiver, you're going to need a better reason than we want NY to have the WTB.

Anyway, I don't understand why there is an obsession with the WTB in NY, when the problem with the skyline is in the 750 - 1000 ft range. I would rather have 10 well placed 1200 ft buildings than one 2300 ft building.

Compare the Chicago skyline to NY, or NY in the 1940s to now.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Do altimeters tell you height above seal level or height above prevailing grade? How does the FAA handle the fact that ground level in Denver is already at 5,000 feet elevation?

Could the FAA learn to think of very tall skyscrapers as geological formations?
I believe airspace is measured referenced to sea level to avoid confusion.

Class-A airspace is above 18,000 ft and covers the entire country. In Denver, the airport is also at 5000 ft, and obviously, there is no airspace below that level.

Skyscrapers are already regarded in the same manner as geological formations. Like the Rocky Mountains, you go over them, not around them.

[ablarc]

Skyscrapers are already regarded in the same manner as geological formations. Like the Rocky Mountains, you go over them, not around them.
...whereas you go around the White House and missile testing ranges.

Maybe then the FAA could think of very tall buildings as no-fly zones instead of geological formations.

That would make sense in the real world, in view of recent events.

[ZippyTheChimp]

We're not going to put this in the hands of Homeland Security, are we?

Building crowns could be color-coded for accident risk based on daily air traffic.

[Jake]

I don't know about midtown but there is no approach path for any NY airport that goes over downtown. Realistically even a 2500' building shouldn't pose a problem because nothing flies that low in that area anyway. I don't think you can buld anything tall between the ESB and downtown because the approach path for JFK's southern strip crosses over there.

They can change a lot. Planes hold over NYC all the time, breaking their pattern and just start their approach in a different place. As long as it fits the approach pattern which starts over Brooklyn and Long Island there shouldn't be any problems. Newark's approaches are almost all over NJ and LaGuardia has them on higher altitudes due to smaller planes. JFK has only one major strip that faces Manhattan and that crosses over ~East Village. Besides just out of common sense, if a pilot is on approach over NYC and he's for some strange reason at 2500' I think it might occur to him that there are buildings that tall there. That in itself would be a violation already because that;s too low for some areas of NY.

As far as that "being lost in the fog" theory which is pretty much responsible for the ESB plane crash, it doesn't hold true anymore. Modern planes don't approach airports based on the pilot's visual assesment but based on guidance beacons. They don't go wondering in NYC airspace looking for an airport.

I think the 2000' number is just some general number they had to come up with. Let's assume the worst case scenario: There is fog, instruments are down, and serendipitiously a plane is southbound over Manhattan Island. If you're lost you don't lower the plane, you pull up, not because of buildings but because of the GROUND. Even at night you;d still see the building a few seconds before you'd hit it, giving time to turn around it. UNLESS YOU'RE AIMING FOR A BUILDING I DON"T THINK IT"S POSSIBLE TO FLY A PLANE INTO IT. Even if, despite everything I said a plane did hit a building, it's unlikely it would destroy it. A landing plane is moving very slow and is near empty because it spent it's fuel. That was the theory for the WTC and it would've worked.

[ZippyTheChimp]

The boundary between controlled space for NWK and LAG is the Hudson River. Whenever I fly in from the south and land at LAG (approach from the nothwest), the plane flies along the western shoreline of the Hudson. I think it's the best view of Manhattan from the air. Look down out of a right side window, and you will see Woolworth below.

[lofter1]

I don't know about midtown but there is no approach path for any NY airport that goes over downtown...

Are you sure?

I live downtown and often passenger jets do a sweeping turn overhead from west to east and then turn north (seemingly as they approach La Guardia).

I know it's crazy but when I catch the sight out of the corner of my eye 4 years later it still gives me the willies.

[evil_synth]

It's next to impossible to put any building over a good-massed 800 ft building between the ESB and Downtown. The reason being that the ground simply cannot support the weight of a large building. Midtown and downtown rest on solid bedrock which can support larger buildings, this is not the case for the space inbetween.
Also, Dubai is building the world'd largest airport because it is within 6 hours of financial centers of Europe and Asia, thereby about to be making it one of the most heavily air travelled cities in the world. If Dubai can have 2000 ft mountains in the middle of extremely crowded airspace, we can surely find a way as well.
I think we should start building a couple 1600-1800 ft skyscrapers in Manhattan to give a nice balance.

[ablarc]

Where there's a will, there's...

[ZippyTheChimp]

If Dubai can have 2000 ft mountains in the middle of extremely crowded airspace, we can surely find a way as well.
I think we should start building a couple 1600-1800 ft skyscrapers in Manhattan to give a nice balance.Dubai sits on the coast. There are about 30 miles of desert between the city and the mountains to the east. The mountains are far enough away not to be a factor when a plane makes its approach descent. And there is the open expanse of the Gulf. The airport in Dubai may become busy, but not the regional airspace.

In contrast, the distance from Midtown to the three airports is:
JFK: 12 mi
NWK: 10
LAG: 5

[evil_synth]

What about the 2300 ft tower and all those other skyscrapers rising up, could they become a problem possibly too?

Well, I suppose planes could be directed to go south and then head north going on opposites sides of Manhattan Island, but not over it.

[ZippyTheChimp]

What about the 2300 ft tower and all those other skyscrapers rising up, could they become a problem possibly too?

Reread what I said about the airspace of Dubai. It is unlike the congestion in New York. If UAE govt is smart, it will build the airport so that the runways utilize the waters of the Gulf and the desert for glide paths - out of the city.

Get yourself a metro map with all three airports on it. Extend lines out in both directions from the north-south and the east-west runways. Keep in mind that over 8000 aircraft enter the metro airspace every day, and boxes have to be found for all those planes.

The sky looks empty to us, but in reality, it's extremely crowded. From an air-traffic controller's perspective, it would be ridiculous to navigate a U-turn around Manhattan island.

[Jake]

from Senator Schumer's website

Over most of the city, all that a pilot has to do as long he or she stays below 2,000 feet is obtain routine permission from air traffic controllers so that they can track them on radar. Under this routine, which is called “Route Permission,” a pilot only has to radio ground control as he or she approaches New York City and relay the intent to travel over the area. No detailed flight plans are required. Because Air Traffic Control does not know what specific path an aircraft plans to take, they are unable to easily determine if a pilot has left his or her course as part of a deliberate attack on a building, a bridge, or an area with a high density of people in it.


Let's not get all crazy, you guys do realize that even if flying over downtown and midtown were banned alltogehter that would be a loss of less than 1% of all of NY Metro's airspace. I see planes over downtown all the time as well but they aren't directly overhead, they are banking along the Hudson corridor which has always been a major route for planes in the area. BTW, NJ has very tall antennas directly ahead of and behind Newark airport and all they do is light them. Planes don't have to have a straight approach, that's why they bank on take off and landing. This 2000' number is just ridiculous and I don't believe something like that will ever really stop construction of anything. Basically when people were on the WTC observation deck did they have planes passing right over them? No, they pass WAY above them, I don't think any plane has ever had the problem of clearing NY's skyline. Downtown is TINY, it doesn't represent any vital air path.

[ZippyTheChimp]

I am going to state this one more time:

A 2300 foot building (assuming that is what a WTB would have to be) would not be approved by the FAA. A 1600 ft building would be fine, unless it was near an airport.

[ablarc]

But Zippy, times do change. In the early days of English motoring, cars had to be preceded by a runner with a flag.

[ZippyTheChimp]

I only think ahead about 8 days. :)

Of course things may change in the future, but no one really knows in what direction. I always held out hope for Transporter Technology, but then I read a report where a group of scientists were asked what science-fiction technology would be the least likely to occur.

The concensus was "Beam me up, Scotty."

[Alonzo-ny]

I don't know about midtown but there is no approach path for any NY airport that goes over downtown. Realistically even a 2500' building shouldn't pose a problem because nothing flies that low in that area anyway. I don't think you can buld anything tall between the ESB and downtown because the approach path for JFK's southern strip crosses over there.

They can change a lot. Planes hold over NYC all the time, breaking their pattern and just start their approach in a different place. As long as it fits the approach pattern which starts over Brooklyn and Long Island there shouldn't be any problems. Newark's approaches are almost all over NJ and LaGuardia has them on higher altitudes due to smaller planes. JFK has only one major strip that faces Manhattan and that crosses over ~East Village. Besides just out of common sense, if a pilot is on approach over NYC and he's for some strange reason at 2500' I think it might occur to him that there are buildings that tall there. That in itself would be a violation already because that;s too low for some areas of NY.

As far as that "being lost in the fog" theory which is pretty much responsible for the ESB plane crash, it doesn't hold true anymore. Modern planes don't approach airports based on the pilot's visual assesment but based on guidance beacons. They don't go wondering in NYC airspace looking for an airport.

I think the 2000' number is just some general number they had to come up with. Let's assume the worst case scenario: There is fog, instruments are down, and serendipitiously a plane is southbound over Manhattan Island. If you're lost you don't lower the plane, you pull up, not because of buildings but because of the GROUND. Even at night you;d still see the building a few seconds before you'd hit it, giving time to turn around it. UNLESS YOU'RE AIMING FOR A BUILDING I DON"T THINK IT"S POSSIBLE TO FLY A PLANE INTO IT. Even if, despite everything I said a plane did hit a building, it's unlikely it would destroy it. A landing plane is moving very slow and is near empty because it spent it's fuel. That was the theory for the WTC and it would've worked.
this is what i was trying to say, no one is realistically going to hit a building by accident only if they meant it and in that situation it could hit a building regardless if its 1200ft or 2200ft

[Alonzo-ny]

I am going to state this one more time:

A 2300 foot building (assuming that is what a WTB would have to be) would not be approved by the FAA. A 1600 ft building would be fine, unless it was near an airport.

We know that we are discussing the chances of an accident involving of a building above that height and therefore the relevance on this 2000ft figure. I think they made this figure at a time when no-one was going to realistically build that high but i think they could change it

[ZippyTheChimp]

What we haven't considered is that air traffic in the area has increased to the point where a fourth airport (http://www.wirednewyork.com/forum/showthread.php?t=6630&highlight=airport) may be needed.

I know that at least once in the last decade, the "box" that each airplane occupies in the air has been shrunk, because too many proximity alarms were going off.

With the number of flights increasing, I think you are going to need a better argument to bend the rules than we want the WTB.

[ZippyTheChimp]

What we haven't considered is that air traffic in the area has increased to the point where a fourth airport (http://www.wirednewyork.com/forum/showthread.php?t=6630&highlight=airport) may be needed.

I know that at least once in the last decade, the "box" that each airplane occupies in the air has been shrunk, because too many proximity alarms were going off.

With the number of flights increasing, I think you are going to need a better argument to bend the rules than we want the WTB.


this is what i was trying to say, no one is realistically going to hit a building by accident only if they meant it and in that situation it could hit a building regardless if its 1200ft or 2200ft
A plane in fog is flying on instruments. The pilot thinks he is at 3000 ft, but he is actually at 2000 ft.

I know- pilots never make mistakes and equipment never malfunctions.

[Jake]

Weather doesn't make any difference because they fly on digital mapping and not visually. Assuming landing guidance fails for some reason...ok...then they fly on instruments which include the altimeter and the gyroscope. The gyro will tell them if they are descending, so if they were at 3000 and the gyro is level they can't be descending because it can't malfunction. There are two altimeters on planes, one being barometric and one being RF. Barometric altimeters are only used as backups and will get messed up in things like hurricanes but that's really extreme weather. An RF altimeter will bounce a radio signal off the ground and might be off by a few feet but not by 33%. Just saying. The odds of a plane hitting a tall building in NYC are probably like the odds of a satellite decaying in orbit and striking it. Keep in mind there's a few thousand of them up there and many of them are soviet 2 ton steel barrels that nobody's really tracking anymore.:)

4 years and they still don't lock the cockpit or screen passengers enough. I think that's an area we should focus on.

[Citytect]

What do Soviet sattelites have to do with tall buildings in NYC? You really lost me there.

I'm with Zippy on this one. The FAA is going to need something more than skyscraper fanatics screaming "NYC wants the world's tallest building again" before they even consider changing height limits. Not going to happen anytime soon.

[Jake]

My point is that there are lots of flying objects that can accidentaly hit buildings. Theoretically anything is possible, it doesn't mean that we should plan for something that is extremely unlikely to happen. Pilots are almost obsolete when it comes to flying planes, it's all computer guided now, they basically just take-off and land. Planes don't go looking for airports so they can't really get "lost." I am geez, the navigation in my Infiniti can predict where I'm gonna turn when I drive to Boston, airplanes know exactly where the air corridor is. Plan for a deliberate airplane crash, not accidental.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Jake and Alonzo, your comments seem to indicate that you believe the process of setting airspace regulations should accommodate the needs of buildings. It's the other way around. The regulations reflect the needs of air traffic and airport facilities. Structures conform to those regulations.

Generally, a compelling economic factor would be a reason for a variance in the rules. The proposed TV antenna/tower on the pier at Bayonne is an example. The tower needed to be 2000 ft to meet the needs of the broadcasters, and although the location would not have blocked the airport directly, the tower was deemed a hazard by the FAA and rejected.

I could better understand the argument for breaking above 2000 ft if there were a dozen or so 1900 ft towers in the city, and the regulations were seen as stifling development.

[ablarc]

I could better understand the argument for breaking above 2000 ft if there were a dozen or so 1900 ft towers in the city, and the regulations were seen as stifling development.
Sounds promising to me. Let's go for it.

We could start by calling for zoning reform...

[Jake]

ok, i see what you're saying and it makes sense. You're right, if it's a single tower it might be an issue.

I don't know the details of law but is the FAA even allowed to regulate busineess development in a certain state? I don't think the FAA really has any say, if the city approves it it will be built.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Sounds promising to me. Let's go for it.

We could start by calling for zoning reform...
There may be hope in mixed-use buildings that don't eat up FAR. And I think there will always be people that want to live way up high.


I don't know the details of law but is the FAA even allowed to regulate busineess development in a certain state?
Feds do it all the time. Interstate commerce. The Hudson River is federally regulated because it runs through more than one state.

[ablarc]

There may be hope in mixed-use buildings that don't eat up FAR.
Sounds intriguing; what are you referring to?

[ZippyTheChimp]

Sounds intriguing; what are you referring to?
Beekman St, Bloomberg, TWC.
Although it refers to a residential building, this articlestates what I am thinking.

A residential component atop a commercial building is a good fit. Both types of tenants get what they want, and the building is more efficient.

Commercial tenants want large floorplates. Because of the high demand for utilities and elevators in modern office space, the higher you stack these floors, less rentable space you have on the lower floors. Floor 90 robs a little space from 89 through 1.

Residents, especially those in towers, want windows, which is exactly what you get from small floorplates. There is also less of a demand for utilities and elevators in residential space.

Aesthetically, you get a more graceful building, a classic New York skyscraper.

[pianoman11686]

High anxiety

As Dubai rushes to complete the tallest skyscraper on earth, New York is keeping a low profile. Why?

By Corina Zappia

If you’re hoping to erect the world’s tallest building, don’t expect to hold onto the title for very long. Taiwan’s 1,671-foot Taipei 101 tower will have enjoyed the designation for a mere four years before getting knocked off its pedestal in 2008. That’s when construction is expected to be completed on Burj Dubai, a mammoth superstructure in the United Arab Emirates metropolis that will house 160 floors, 40mph elevators and a 30-acre artificial lake. And, at approximately 2,600 feet tall, it will be more than twice the height of our beloved Empire State Building.

Even incomplete, the stratospheric glass fortress is already attracting attention Stateside, as evidenced by “World’s Tallest Building: Burj Dubai,” on display at the Skyscraper Museum through the end of August. “Doing the exhibition now, when it’s just this naked concrete structure, is really a great opportunity,” says museum director Carol Willis. “It demonstrates the scale of the building and its connection to the desert, since concrete is just sand and water. Once skyscrapers are finished, they all look the same. Here, you can really see this structure as it rises.”

Eschewing glitzier details—like the 175-room Giorgio Armani–designed hotel on the building’s lower floors or the ostentatious slogan plastered on its website (“Burj Dubai will be known by many names. But only a privileged group of people will call it home”)—the exhibit looks at the design and construction challenges involved and posits the Middle East mega-edifice within the framework of the century-old skyscraper race. Starting with an aerial view of the coast of Dubai, visitors move through a survey of global superstructures (both completed and under-construction), followed by a level-by-level breakdown of Burj Dubai. Architectural models and a photomontage of ongoing construction give visitors a sense of the massive undertaking involved. (The Burj’s 3,000–6,800 laborers have to work at night during the summer, when daytime temperatures can reach 120 degrees.)

Viewing the museum’s survey of 20th- and 21st-century monoliths, though, it’s hard not to notice the dwindling number located in the West—and especially in New York, a front-runner in the skyscraper race for so long. Today, only the 102-story Empire State Building cracks the top ten—coming in last place.

Unlike midtown’s Art Deco masterpiece, contemporary supertalls are mostly residential and mixed-use monoliths built in Asian cities like Shanghai or Seoul, where exponential population growth provides a constant demand for housing, or in Dubai, where taxes are nonexistent, labor practices are dubious and oil-rich investors subscribe to an “if we build it, they will come” philosophy. So why has New York stopped caring?

“I don’t think there was much interest in building the world’s tallest building here, even before 9/11,” says Andrew Dolkart, a professor of historic preservation at the Columbia School of Architecture. If security were the issue, adds Dolkart, there wouldn’t be any skyscrapers being built here at all.

The real answer, according to Willis, is economics. “The most common romance about skyscrapers is that they’re all about ego—the architect’s ego, the owner’s ego—but they’re always built with other people’s money. And if a financial institution thinks you’re not going to make money on your building, they won’t loan you $3 billion, which is what it’ll cost to build the Freedom Tower.” The Tower, should it ever finally be built, will be the exception to New York’s aversion to superstructures, owing more to sentimentality than to hubris.

Bureaucracy is another factor keeping New York on the down-low. “The city puts a limit on how much space you can pile up on a given lot,” explains Willis. “You can’t assemble enough land to make the world’s tallest building anywhere in the five boroughs.” And there’s little point in tearing down an older edifice. Because of zoning laws, you’d have to replace it with something smaller. (The Twin Towers avoided such regulations because they were built on land owned by the Port Authority.)

The bottom line, Willis believes, is that today, New Yorkers just prefer smaller buildings that don’t overshadow their neighbors or blot out the sun. And, as both Willis and Dolkart agree, we no longer have to prove our mettle by bragging about the length of our edifices. “Every now and then, someone like Donald Trump will say, ‘I’m going to build the world’s tallest building,’ ” says Dolkart. “And everyone just yawns.”

“World’s Tallest Building: Burj Dubai” is on view at the Skyscraper Museum through Aug 31. (http://www.timeout.com/newyork/Details.do?page=1&xyurl=xyl://TONYWebEvents1/the_skyscraper_museum_39_battery_pl_181944.xml)

Copyright ©2007 Time Out New York. (http://www.timeout.com/newyork/Details.do?page=1&xyurl=xyl://TONYWebArticles1/611/around_town/high_anxiety.xml)

[macreator]

The article notes that there isn't a spot in NYC where even a developer with a gigantic ego and cash could hope to construct a world's tallest building due to zoning and air rights constraints. Is this true? And if so, is perhaps now the time to loosen such limitations in emerging districts like the Far West Side or even Long Island City?

[Hamilton]

The article notes that there isn't a spot in NYC where even a developer with a gigantic ego and cash could hope to construct a world's tallest building due to zoning and air rights constraints. Is this true? And if so, is perhaps now the time to loosen such limitations in emerging districts like the Far West Side or even Long Island City?

Yeah, right. Manhattan may have the hemisphere's highest incidence of skyscraper allergies in the hemisphere. God forbid anybody build a 500-foot skyscraper, lest entire Community Boards' heads simultaneously explode en masse.

[Hamilton]

The article notes that there isn't a spot in NYC where even a developer with a gigantic ego and cash could hope to construct a world's tallest building due to zoning and air rights constraints. Is this true? And if so, is perhaps now the time to loosen such limitations in emerging districts like the Far West Side or even Long Island City?

Yeah, right. Manhattan may have the hemisphere's highest incidence of skyscraper allergies in the hemisphere. God forbid anybody build a 500-foot skyscraper, lest entire Community Boards' heads simultaneously explode en masse.

New York will be entombed in time, just like Paris, but at larger height/density; instead of Second Empire predominating, Modernism will be the prevailing architectural style.

[TonyO]

That Time Out article is a sign of the times in my opinion while having a dismissive tone. Things will swing back the other direction and we'll start building taller again. It's funny that the same day this article appeared the one in the Sun talking about two 1400' towers at the current Penn/MSG site was published. Just wait, I say. There are so many variables: construction techniques, cost of construction, value of the $, etc.

I view the ambition in building tall buildings as similar to high speed trains. If you think the current Acela route is the best that the US will do, you're not thinking clearly. Same thing with super-tall towers, just as important as financing is will. It's just not there right now.

[kliq6]

In four years NY will have 7 buildings over 1,000 feet ( more then any other city in the world including Chicago), so I think that answers the question

[londonlawyer]

In four years NY will have 7 buildings over 1,000 feet ( more then any other city in the world including Chicago), so I think that answers the question

1. FT
2. ESB
3. 1 WTC
4. 2 WTC
5. 3 WTC

What else? Pennsylvania Hotel tower?

[Ebola]

1WTC - 1,776' | 1MSG - 1,400'+ | 2MSG - 1,400'+ | 2WTC - 1,340'
3WTC - 1,255' | ESB - 1,250' | BoA - 1,200' | 80SS - 1,123'
Westside - 1,000'+?x | NYTT - 1,046' | Chrysler Building -1,046'
Plus other supertalls soon, like w/ the Hotel Penn site

We will have at least a dozen supertalls. We are going to see a lot soon.

[kliq6]

1. FT
2. ESB
3. 1 WTC
4. 2 WTC
5. 3 WTC

What else? Pennsylvania Hotel tower?

FT 1,776
200 Greenwich Street 1,350
175 Greenwich 1,255
ESB 1,250
BOA 1,200
NY Times is 1046
Chrysler is 1,046

[kliq6]

from Senator Schumer's website


Let's not get all crazy, you guys do realize that even if flying over downtown and midtown were banned alltogehter that would be a loss of less than 1% of all of NY Metro's airspace. I see planes over downtown all the time as well but they aren't directly overhead, they are banking along the Hudson corridor which has always been a major route for planes in the area. BTW, NJ has very tall antennas directly ahead of and behind Newark airport and all they do is light them. Planes don't have to have a straight approach, that's why they bank on take off and landing. This 2000' number is just ridiculous and I don't believe something like that will ever really stop construction of anything. Basically when people were on the WTC observation deck did they have planes passing right over them? No, they pass WAY above them, I don't think any plane has ever had the problem of clearing NY's skyline. Downtown is TINY, it doesn't represent any vital air path.


I was up there in 1992 and a plane came by and we could wave to the people in the plane, I remeber that foundly of the twins

[londonlawyer]

FT 1,776
200 Greenwich Street 1,350
175 Greenwich 1,255
ESB 1,250
BOA 1,200
NY Times is 1046
Chrysler is 1,046

Gracias.

[Alonzo-ny]

The title to this thread is kind of ironic considering the momentum that is building now, so many buildings u/c, proposed and its getting exciting now. Dubai? where the hell is that?

[Ninjahedge]

We all have to realize that the term "skyscraper" is relative. NYC has more high rises than just about any other city in the world, but since they are all about the same height, and no real megalith structures are present, we start crying about "no skyscrapers".

Come on.

As the need for space increases, we will see more building occur, but seeing how densely packed NYC is compared to the surrounding areas, we will probably have a bit of a wait before something is warranted as being necessary to that extent.

[BrooklynRider]

FT 1,776
200 Greenwich Street 1,350
175 Greenwich 1,255
ESB 1,250
BOA 1,200
NY Times is 1046
Chrysler is 1,046

I don't think NYT or BoA belong on that list, regardless of "official height."

[Jeffreyny]

I don't think NYT or BoA belong on that list, regardless of "official height."

I agree. The BoA at 1200 ft. is ridiculous. It will barely peak above the midtown plateu.

[ZippyTheChimp]

but seeing how densely packed NYC is compared to the surrounding areas,Good point.

City density (people/sq mile):

Dubai....................900
Houston...............3000
LA.......................8000
London...............12000
Chicago..............12000
Boston...............12000
Hong Kong.........16000
SF.....................16000
NYC...................26000
Tokyo................35000
Buenos Aires......35000
Manhattan..........67000

[Fabrizio]

City density (people/sq mile):

Dubai....................900
vs
Manhattan..........67000

Do you really think the wealthy of Dubai would want mega-tall skyscrapers if their city was as tightly packed as Manhattan? Quality-of-life issues are most important for the wealthy.

They'd be blocking them too.

[Ninjahedge]

Dubai is not a practical structure. It is a penis envy building. It is showing that these rich guys can build something incredible, with no real purpose, just because they can.

Kind of reminds me a bit of Disneyworld.....

And I will say again, it is amazing how our definition of "skyscraper" changes as we get used to tall buildings in our proximity.

I guess the sky is just getting higher. :rolleyes:

[kliq6]

I don't think NYT or BoA belong on that list, regardless of "official height."

fair but then ESB would be smaller then AON center in Chicago without its spire

[pianoman11686]

Just a general clarification for some of the comments: the article wasn't necessarily saying that super-tall skyscrapers were done in New York, but that the prospect of a new world's tallest seems very unlikely. On that note, here's another article (published earlier this year) that echoes some of those sentiments. I was considering posting it in the can anybody here build anything (http://www.wirednewyork.com/forum/showthread.php?t=6485&highlight=can+anybody+here+build+anything) thread, but I think it fits in this thread too.

---

Lust for Height

By Philip Nobel
From the January/February 2007 Issue
Filed under: Big Ideas

The Burj Dubai, slated to be the tallest building in the world when it’s done in 2009, is rising 160 stories or more (the final height is a secret) in the desert. It’s no anomaly. The terrorist attacks of 9/11 seem to have whetted the global appetite to build taller and taller. Most of the new mega-skyscrapers are in Asia and the Middle East, but the engineers and architects are American. Why the boom? A combination of economic imperatives and powerful egos, both national and personal. Coming soon: the fulfillment of Frank Lloyd Wright’s dream of a mile-high building.

In October, at the premier international conference of skyscraper builders, the first speaker announced without a hint of irony or doubt that by 2030, somewhere, a mile-high skyscraper would be built. Five thousand two hundred and eighty feet. One-tenth of the way to the ozone layer. More than three times as tall as anything now stand*ing and exactly as high as the most fantastic towers ever dared conceived.

When the speaker made this prediction, there was no murmur of dissent from his colleagues, not a single snicker. Nor was David Scott, an accom*plished engineer and the chairman of the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat, hustled off the stage and gently dosed back to a normative view of what can be achieved by mortals. The 750 planners, designers, and technicians in the room met his statement with a shrug—not, it seemed, because Mr. Scott had lost the thread, not because they were jaded by the repetition of an ancient dream (mile-high towers were proposed by Frank Lloyd Wright in the 1950s and by Norman Foster in the 1980s) but because what he said was so obvious, so attain*able. For many years it has been a commonplace in the profession that no impediments to such heights exist: the technologies are waiting for the money and the willing client.

Indeed, sitting there in rows, a half-story below ground in an auditorium on the Chicago campus of the Illinois Institute of Technology, were the very people who could build a tower one mile high: the foundation engineers who already knew how to pin such a thing to the earth, the structural engineers who could keep it standing in a 100-year wind, the architects who would give it form, the contractors who would know how to phase the behemoth’s con*struction—even the guys who would have to figure out how to wash the windows. And there are going to be a lot of windows.

Welcome to Babel. The language is English, the units are metric, the know-how is mostly American, and the site is anywhere in the world where money, land, and opportunity converge, catalyzed by opti*mism—personal, corporate, or national. Five years after September 11, well into what was expected to be the post-skyscraper era, a boom of increas*ingly improbable proportions is underway and it shows no signs of abating. Like a bar graph mea*suring increased faith in the future, the towers keep getting taller—after lingering for decades around 1,400 feet, the height now needed to achieve a jaw-dropping wow-factor is approaching 2,000 feet—and all the biggest are clustered far from the building type’s familiar centers in North America.

“Everyone I know flies from Dubai to Tokyo to Shanghai to Hong Kong to Taipei,” says Carol Willis, an architectural historian and founder of New York’s Skyscraper Museum. “They’re almost never home.”

The current “world’s tallest” titleholder, the 101-story tower completed in Taipei in 2004, stands at a sinister 1,666 feet. When it is completed in 2008, the Lotte World II Tower in Busan, South Korea, will edge seven feet higher. The Burj Dubai, an epochal construction, stands now at about 1,000 feet with only 90 of its planned 160-plus stories completed; when it is finished in 2009, it may top out at over 2,600 feet—however, just as in the great Manhattan skyscraper race of the late 1920s (which the Chrysler Building won with its extended spire before being dwarfed in 1931 by the Empire State Building), the true planned height is a closely guarded secret. The Burj Dubai’s lead architect, Adrian Smith (until recently with the Chicago office of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill but now doing busi*ness as Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture), says that as soon as the final number is announced, a competing developer in Dubai will release plans for an even higher tower. A building down the Emirates coast in Doha, to be completed next year, will likely make little news: at 1,460 feet, it is a baby—only ten feet taller than the Sears Tower, which, with 108 floors, has been the tallest building in the United States for the last 33 years and is now (but for not much longer) the third-tallest in the world.

What’s behind the new boom? The quick answer, of course, is money. Except for very rare exceptions like the polemically motivated, 1,083-foot-tall Ryugyong Tower in Pyongyang, North Korea (if its stalled construction resumes, it will be the world’s tallest hotel), skyscrapers are built for two reasons: to make money, responding to existing demand, or to advertise and flaunt the money one already has. The current boom is driven by both, but the latter impetus—the realm of ego, personal or national—seems to be winning the day.

Of the ten tallest towers now standing, six are in China. In Shanghai—to pick but one impossibly dynamic city—nearly 100 buildings over 500 feet tall (typically, around 40 stories) were put up in the last decade. New York, the city with the most such buildings, has erected fewer than 200 in its entire history. The Shanghai skyscrapers were built in a direct response to the demand for space, associ*ated with the ferocious reawakening of the Chinese economy—that is, to make money, responding to demand.

The old formula for what drives skyscraper construction—high density plus high land values equals high buildings—is quite undone by the new class of super-tall buildings, rising as they so often do from the wide-open spaces of unformed young cities.By contrast, the twin Petronas Towers—which by climbing 33 feet higher than Sears took the tall-building title out of the United States in 1998—were built primarily to make visible the roar of Malaysia’s Asian Tiger (that is, to satisfy ego). The towers didn’t make a dime, and they still stand largely vacant, but now we all know that the folks in Kuala Lumpur can think big. The increasingly quix*otic constructions in Kuwait or Riyadh or Dubai—such as the Babel-like Burj itself, which will house an Armani-branded hotel, boutique offices, and luxury residences—can be seen as the product of a pool of investment capital searching for a purpose and finding it, as skyscraper builders always have, in self-aggrandizement.

That popular function of tall build*ings—to confer glory—easily survived the recent demonstration of their fra*gility. On the morning of September 11, 2001, Adrian Smith was at a meet*ing in Chicago with representatives of the Trump Organization. On the wall were three schemes he had designed for a tower Donald Trump was planning to build there. Each of the proposed designs, at 2,000 feet, would have been the tallest in the city, the country, and the world. The meeting stopped when someone turned on a TV just as the second plane hit. “Everyone went home, and then they called back and said, ‘Let’s make it 900 feet,’” Smith said. “They didn’t want to be the tallest anymore.” But Trump, perhaps the only American developer equipped with a grand enough self-regard to play today’s international tallest-tower game, soon recovered most of his nerve; his Chicago build*ing, well under construction along the river near Michigan Avenue, will be over 1,300 feet tall, 92 stories, when it is completed next year.

Despite the eruption of concern over safety, fanned by the media, even at Ground Zero itself there was only a very brief post-9/11 pause in enthusiasm for skyscrapers. Among some groups, the attack even made tall towers more popular. Within days, people around the world were calling for the reconstruction of the Twin Towers or the construction of something even higher, and hundreds of amateur folk archi*tects were drawing and circulating defiant designs. Within hours of the attack, some of the world’s lead*ing pedigreed architects were sketching their own very high solutions for the site. As early as the spring of 2002, erecting the world’s tallest tower at Ground Zero had become part of the official program, and when Daniel Libeskind’s first version of Freedom Tower, with its symbolic height of 1,776 feet, was unveiled in late February 2003, it was expected to be the tallest in the world. Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, the firm that would soon also control the design of Freedom Tower, began work on the Burj Dubai in March.

“Well, 9/11 came and everyone said, ‘No more high-rise buildings,’” a New York architect involved in skyscraper construction recalled. “It took about a year, then it just exploded. I can’t find a place except maybe South America that’s not booming. don’t know what it is….” He trailed off, then added: “I do know what it is, it’s ego.”

“It’s so Freudian it’s ridiculous,” another New York skyscraper architect said.

Architectural historians—among them Carol Willis, in her book Form Follows Finance—have long made the case that skyscrapers are primar*ily shaped by monetary tides: the flow of capital, the cost of land and materials and labor, and pro*jected demand. For a developer or entrepreneur to build something as exquisitely risky as a very tall tower, all of these factors have to meet at the proper values—and stay there long enough for the client to rally designers and secure funding for the cam*paign. The classic catalyst in this model is density, the argument being that in circumscribed commer*cial centers (like those in New York and Chicago, hemmed in by water), limited space to build forced land values, and therefore building heights, through the roof. The skyscraper was born.

But what held true at the birth is less relevant in rangy adolescence. The old formula for what drives skyscraper construction—high density plus high land values equals high buildings—is quite undone by the new class of super-tall buildings, ris*ing as they so often do from the wide- open spaces of unformed young cities. Is there any limit on the ground in Sharq, Kuwait, to force the builders of the Al Hamra & Firdous Tower to go up 60 feet higher than the Empire State Building—making it, if it were completed today, the seventh-tallest building in the world? American archi*tects who have suggested high-density, low-rise schemes to satisfy the same pro*grammatic demands find that they usually lose their audience, if not the job. “The cli*ents are driving the height,” one said.

“In the Middle East, they’re wealthy and if they can do it”—build extremely tall—“they do,” said Bill Pedersen of New York’s Kohn Pedersen Fox, architect of the Shanghai World Financial Center, or SWFC, which will be the second-tallest building in the world when it is completed next year. “In Asia, it’s totally different: the density just has to be dealt with.” But extra-economic rivalries of the sort that might lead one tower to overtop another certainly exist. Although it was intended to be the world’s tallest, the SWFC stalled for some years in development and will now be shorter—by 52 feet—than Taipei 101, which was fast-tracked (so much so that wind tunnel testing was only done after the foundation was poured, and major modifications to the plan, including the characteristic chamfer*ing of the building’s corners, had to be made during construction). A design competition is now under*way for a second parcel at the SWFC, known as Z3; earlier renderings showed a more modest building on the site, but the competition brief calls for tow*ers up to 2,200 feet tall, bringing Asia’s tallest back across the Strait.

But even here, the motivations for one-upman*ship are not purely nationalistic—or at least, in the new global stew, not quite as they appear. This is about business, and what ideology enters the recipe is personal. The developer of the SWFC is Minoru Mori, the Japanese real estate tycoon who collects paintings by Le Corbusier and fashions himself a social visionary, pro*moting mixed-use skyscraper cities that will spare Japanese businessmen their long commutes. “He has the money to build whatever he wants,” Carol Willis said, “but Mori builds towers because he thinks they’ll improve the quality of life.”

With Z3, Mori may be trying to return the tallest-tower title to his property in Shanghai (otherwise it will go, in 2008, to the Lotte tower in Korea), but he may also want to return the shine to his name in China. Bill Pedersen’s original design for the SWFC called for a tower that tapered on all sides, from a square footprint on the ground to a single line at its roof, with an enormous circle cut all the way through the narrow upper stories—ostensibly to relieve wind loads, but more probably to create a symbolic gesture of the sort architects use to distinguish one very tall tower from the next. Nationalists in China, compar*ing the circular void to the Japanese flag, protested the incursion, and, after many redesigns taking many years, the tower will now be built with an enormous square cutout instead: politically neu*tral. (Mori, by the way, wants to change the SWFC’s name to “Shanghai Hills,” an echo of several of his other projects, including Tokyo’s Omotesando Hills and Roppongi Hills. He had to get approval from Shanghai’s government, which, as of late November, was not forthcoming.)

It is in such cases—and in the reaction against them—that we see the most primal motivation for skyscraper construction: to stake a claim, to mark the land, to show how your power (read: money) can change the world, both physically and psy*chologically. Nothing says “I am master of the universe”—the natural, societal, and financial uni*verses—more clearly than the erection of a tall building. And if it can be taller than all the rest, so much the better.


“If you look at the history of the world’s tallest building, it is no secret that eco*nomic need has not been at the forefront,” said Antony Wood, executive director of the Council on Tall Buildings. “The quest to build the world’s tallest building comes with a certain ego attached.”

It has not always been so. “Previously, it has been about corporate ambition,” Wood continued, referring to the great era of American skyscraper building in the last century. “But now, for the past 10 or 15 years, it has transformed to be about national, or even personal ambition: cit*ies see tall buildings as a way to signpost their success.”

Few localities have ever pursued such signposting with the fervor of Dubai. Unable to rely on the traditional revenue stream of its Persian Gulf neighbors—oil accounts for only 6 percent of GDP—the city has instead embarked on a success*ful campaign to retool as an international free trade zone and business hub, leverag*ing its enviable position halfway between Europe and the thriving economies of the East. Architecture—extravagant, wonder-of-the-world architecture—has been the preferred means to promote that goal. Each month sees a new fantastic tower or waterfront development completed or announced, and their improbable forms—the sail-like eminence of the Burj Al-Arab hotel, for instance, or the archipelago of 300 man-made islands that will soon form a new development zone in the image of a map of the earth—ensure col*umn inches and TV time all over the world. In Dubai at least, attention-getting and bragging rights have replaced density and demand as the principal pres*sures on development.

Nothing but such pride-driven international competition could nurture a glorious aberration like the Burj Dubai (“burj” means tower in Arabic). Local land-use economics certainly can’t explain it. In Dubai, typically, the government (in the person of the prince) will donate property for developments it sees as beneficial. The site of the Burj Dubai is a huge decommis*sioned military base at the edge of town, directly abutting the flat emptiness of the interior. And still Emaar Properties, the powerful local developer in charge of the project, is going to pack three million lease*able square feet onto its relatively compact footprint—the same area as a moderately sized shopping mall parking lot—with loads of open land to the horizon.

“It was always the height,” Adrian Smith says of his Dubai clients. “That was the one thing they were trying to do.”

Although the building is already pay*ing off in favorable publicity and regard for Dubai, as it was designed to do—no fewer than 200 articles mentioned it last year—Smith is quick to point out that the tower will also be an earnings winner for Emaar: “These buildings are typically built for other reasons than to make money,” he said. “The Burj Dubai is actually going to make money.” The tower sits at the center of a 30-million-square-foot development—an area that includes residential towers, rec*reational facilities, and what is being billed as the world’s largest shopping mall, the whole expected to cost about $800 million. Although the tower is spoken for—it filled in three days when space went on sale several years ago—the real payoff may come through using the Burj as a sort of elephantine loss-leader; according to Bill Baker, the lead engineer on the project for Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, units in the surrounding Emaar-built residences that will face the tower are selling out too: “You always want a room with a view.”

Baker links the extravagant height of his Dubai tower to the fact that it’s not filled with offices. “A lot of these very tall buildings are residential, where you’re getting into the world of discretion*ary income,” he said. “Your company car might be a Ford, but your personal car is a Porsche. It comes down to what the market will bear. This is a moneymaking proposition for our client.” But he too acknowledges the fun*damental “signposting” function of the Burj Dubai. “It’s the marker, like sticking the flag,” Baker said. “just another thing that makes Dubai better known. Before the Petronas Towers, no one knew where Kuala Lumpur was.”

Elsewhere, necessarily on a smaller scale, cities not previously known to express their might in height are getting into the game. Moscow’s Federation Tower will have 93 stories and a spire reaching 1,470 feet when it is completed this year. In December, Gazprom released images of a towering new headquarters in St. Petersburg that will rise almost 1,300 feet. London, codes were recently changed to allow skyscrapers to proliferate, against the European norm, in the central city, and the internationally acclaimed architect Renzo Piano has designed a tower, known as “The Shard,” that will be the tallest in town at 1,000 feet when it is completed in 2011. seems, in fact, that 1,000 feet is emerging as the benchmark height for towers in height-averse cities still seek*ing to grab headlines with their skylines in an age of giants. The mayor of Boston, Thomas Menino, has been pushing for the con*struction of a new civic high point there for some time—not purely in response to demand but to sig*nal the reinvigoration of the city far and wide; a design for a 1,000-foot tower by Piano was revealed in November.

It’s clear that the spirit of competitive civic aggrandizement is infectious, but it takes on a different form in mature commercial capitals. American cities, eye-catching architecture is, of course, employed to imbue a place with distinction—and to suggest its relative merit to rivals. But that function in the U.S. has largely fallen to cul*tural buildings, following the model of Fran*cois Mitterand’s grands projets for Paris (I. M. Pei’s glass pyramid at the Louvre, Carlos Ott’s Opera Bastille, and so on), though without the national-government patron*age: Frank Gehry’s shiny new Disney Hall in Los Angeles and Chicago’s Millennium Park (which also features an iconic Gehry music venue) are two recent examples.

In New York City, the regular march of corporate ambition has resulted in a hand*ful of fine new skyscrapers—for Hearst, The New York Times, Condé Nast. Even the accounting firm Ernst & Young is in flashy new quarters on the hottest corner of Times Square. But none of these has even come close to surpassing maximum local heights. One very tall tower is going up in Manhat*tan—the 1,200-foot-tall Bank of America building—but, while it will be higher than everything in town except the Empire State, the focus of publicity (in the press and in ads plastered on the construction fence) has been its innovative, environmentally con*scious building systems.

Height for height’s sake has had its day in New York. In the absence of extraordi*nary circumstances, as at Ground Zero, even the giddiest observer would have to put long odds on the world’s tallest build*ing returning to Manhattan, or to any American city. Local ground rules are largely to blame. In the United States, and New York in par*ticular, there is typically a skein of codes and public review processes that inhibit revolutionary breaks with the norm—restrictions that simply don’t exist in cities without a long history of building tall, or in nations without durable mechanisms to pro*tect workers.

Costs associated with unionized construction labor are famously prohibitive here—a problem unknown in China, with its surfeit of manpower, or the Middle East, where Asian guest workers are invariably employed and, to put it charita*bly, labor rights are not so well respected. Last year, protests over low wages and poor working conditions by workers on the Dubai Mall, adjacent to the Burj Dubai, erupted in riots that led to over a million dollars in damage to property and equip*ment and in stalled construction for a time on the entire site.

The developing world also lacks America’s thriving NIMBY industry—the preservationists, public intellectuals, and grassroots local groups that rally to the call of “not in my backyard.” Westway, an ambitious park and highway plan for Manhattan proposed in the 1970s, still stands as the most significant grand urban project to fall to protest, but the power accumulated by downtown residents in the debate over the future of Ground Zero (and the results they achieved in shap*ing the project to their needs) attests to the role that public resistance can play in tempering even the most exceptional civic vision. Even if the will were present and the money lined up, a normal American sky*scraper, free of symbolic freight, doesn’t stand a chance now to reach an interna*tionally competitive height.

Cost and resistance are part of the story, but the most pressing reason that we won’t soon see a Burj Chicago is more subtle, more emotional: the lack in America’s traditional urban centers of that upstart spirit, a kind of invin*cible optimism, possibly shading into hubris, that is the birthright of the achieving underdog, and that will move people to pursue what may be an econom*ically irrational goal in order to make their potential known to the wider world. In other words, chutzpah. That spirit was abundant in the past—the Empire State Building so outstripped economic necessity that for years it was referred to as the Empty State Building—but now that typically American quality is flourishing in points East.

At the Council on Tall Buildings confer*ence, rumors were flying that there were buildings already on the boards that would make the Burj Dubai look quaint—towers that would begin to close the gap between what is possible and what gets built. Leslie Robertson, who engineered the Twin Towers, was working on one such titan, it was said, possibly for the firm founded by I. M. Pei. Whether the story is true is immaterial (Robertson, trotting the globe, could not be reached)—it seems inevitable that the Burj Dubai, whatever its final height, will be overtopped in time, and it is just as inevita*ble that the building that beats it won’t be built in the United States. “Almost every week we see a proposal for the world’s tall*est building,” the council’s director, Antony Wood, said.

Skyscrapers are built to make space, they are built to make money, but they are also built to make a point: they are built to awe. And when we do get our true mile-high tower—in 2030, or sooner, or later—one thing is certain: behind the financing, the army of workers, the engineers’ numbers, and the architects’ specs, there will stand one hell of a giant ego—personal, corporate, or national, but still requiring its likeness to be etched in the clouds.

“There’s a real can-do, will-do attitude in China and the Middle East,” the engineer Bill Baker said. “We interviewed for the Burj in March 2003. We got the commission in April. And now we’re already up 90 floors in the air. That tells you a lot about where those countries are in their optimism, not unlike the U.S. in an earlier time. I hope we haven’t lost it.”

Philip Nobel is a Brooklyn-based writer whose column, “Far Corner,” can be found monthly in Metropolis (http://www.metropolismag.com/cda/index.php) magazine. He is the author of “Sixteen Acres: Architecture and the Outrageous Struggle for the Future of Ground Zero” (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0805074945/102-9324056-8109758?ie=UTF8&tag=theamerica077-20&linkCode=xm2&camp=1789&creativeASIN=0805074945) (Metropolitan Books).

http://www.american.com/archive/2007/january-february-magazine-contents/0116-lust-for-height

[pianoman11686]

Do you really think the wealthy of Dubai would want mega-tall skyscrapers if their city was as tightly packed as Manhattan? Quality-of-life issues are most important for the wealthy.

They'd be blocking them too.


Height for height’s sake has had its day in New York. In the absence of extraordi*nary circumstances, as at Ground Zero, even the giddiest observer would have to put long odds on the world’s tallest build*ing returning to Manhattan, or to any American city. Local ground rules are largely to blame. In the United States, and New York in par*ticular, there is typically a skein of codes and public review processes that inhibit revolutionary breaks with the norm—restrictions that simply don’t exist in cities without a long history of building tall, or in nations without durable mechanisms to pro*tect workers.

[...]

The developing world also lacks America’s thriving NIMBY industry—the preservationists, public intellectuals, and grassroots local groups that rally to the call of “not in my backyard.” [...] Even if the will were present and the money lined up, a normal American sky*scraper, free of symbolic freight, doesn’t stand a chance now to reach an interna*tionally competitive height.

.

[BrooklynRider]

fair but then ESB would be smaller then AON center in Chicago without its spire

Agreed, but the ESB spire is structural, whereas BoA and NYT spires are poles thrown on top to give them ridiculously bloated official heights.

[NYatKNIGHT]

^Right, you can walk around in the ESP spire, it should definitely count.

[Fabrizio]

So THIS is why the US (and I guess we should throw in European as well) is not building buildings of an "internationally competitive height":

(from the article posted above)

- codes

- public review processes

- durable mechanisms to protect workers.

- preservationists

- public intellectuals

- grassroots local groups


In other words, the elements of a modern, mature and civilized democracy?

[pianoman11686]

I'm sure the last thing on Philip Nobel's mind is a desire to see the US adopt Dubai's, or China's, political and legal system. His arguments are less "this is why we are failing" and more "this is how others are succeeding." Now the question is, what would we be willing to do to be more like "them" while retaining the most important pieces that make us "us"?

[Alonzo-ny]

Thing is most of these towers in dubai look like crap and dont work architecturally especially at street level, china to a lesser extent but horrible urban environments. we might not have a tallest again but we will have really tall buildings as long as people want to live in Manhattan. and we will build taller. a few years it seemed all was lost but we have a brilliant new trade center and a great future on the westside.

[macreator]

That's the truth. In terms of urban planning, buildings like Jin Mao tower and the new Shanghai World Financial Center, towers that I think are beautiful, are terribly integrated into their surroundings. There was one photo posted in a thread a few months back that showed these two buildings sitting in grassy parks, right across the street from each other, totally disconnected from the urban fabric. By the way, that "street" was more like a 12 lane expressway with crosswalks.

[antinimby]

^ The irony of all this is that New Yorkers (at least the vocal ones) are now more in favor of that very type of development, lots of green space between buildings. They call it open space.

[macreator]

^ The irony of all this is that New Yorkers (at least the vocal ones) are now more in favor of that very type of development, lots of green space between buildings. They call it open space.

That is one of my greatest worries about the Atlantic Yards project. Beyond the fact that it is all being developed by one developer, and designed by one architect (quite a tough way to build a diverse cityscape), the fact that the project demaps some streets and creates superblocks with "green space" abutting the street between buildings makes me wonder whether we're going back down the road that led us to the "tower in the park" housing projects that act as walls through neighborhoods.

[Merry]

On the Horizon, a New Manhattan Skyline

By ANTON TROIANOVSKI

The city's approval of an office tower near the Empire State Building last week is the latest reminder that New York is poised for one of its biggest waves of skyscraper development in decades—provided the economy cooperates.

Developers are readying two residential towers that will rise above most of Midtown. The massive mixed-use development planned west of Penn Station would transform Manhattan's skyline as viewed from New Jersey. Downtown, the transformation is already happening, with the warped, metallic skin of Frank Gehry's Beekman Tower looming over the neighborhood around City Hall and, at Ground Zero, 1 World Trade Center already rising to 36 stories.

Looking Skyward

http://si.wsj.net/public/resources/images/NY-AL335A_NYSKY_G_20100829211830.jpg

Some of the proposed alterations to the city's skyline have been opposed. Vornado Realty Trust's plan to build a tower near Penn Station attracted criticism from people wanting to preserve the Empire State Building's iconic spot.

But the new projects are being propelled by powerful forces. The City Council's near-unanimous approval of the Vornado project is a sign that elected officials are much more concerned about producing jobs than aesthetic concerns. "They were saying New York needs new buildings," says Carol Willis, director of the Skyscraper Museum. "Before that, I would've said that New Yorkers like their city just fine the way it looks right now."

At the same time, backers of these projects are pointing out that the city needs to modernize office space to preserve its competitive position against other global cities like London and Hong Kong. In a letter to shareholders this year Vornado Chairman Steve Roth said the 40 million square feet of office space along Park Avenue from Grand Central Terminal to 59th Street is, on average, 45 years old. He called on the city to allow for denser construction on the avenue to give builders an incentive to tear down old buildings and create new and larger towers.

http://si.wsj.net/public/resources/images/OB-JT075_SkyLin_DV_20100829220802.jpg

As the economic doldrums wear on, the city's politicians seem to be coming around to that idea. "We need new, modern buildings to accommodate the new business model that's out there today all over the world," Mark Weprin, chairman of the City Council's subcommittee on zoning and franchises, said at a press conference before last week's council meeting.

Of course, most of the projects aren't going to move ahead until the economy improves, more financing becomes available and demand for commercial space and apartments picks up. Rents in top-tier Manhattan office buildings are still some 20% off their peak. "This is still at least a year or two from the right circumstances for a deal, let alone construction," Michael Knott, who tracks office landlords for real-estate research firm Green Street Advisors, said of the prospects for Vornado's 15 Penn Plaza. "Getting approvals now is just prudent planning, not a signal to ready the cranes."

Some projects that got going before the bust are moving forward. The Beekman Tower, Forest City Enterprises Inc.'s $800 million, Frank-Gehry-designed residential skyscraper has already reached its 867-foot height. It's close to the 792-foot Woolworth Building, another iconic tower that was once the tallest in the world and has since been dwarfed by modern skyscrapers.

At the World Trade Center site, two office towers are already rising and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey last week cemented a deal with developer Larry Silverstein that allows him to continue with building Tower 4 and promises as much as $600 million in public support for Tower 3.

Meantime, in Midtown, developer Gary Barnett is building a 1,000-foot residential tower on 57th Street thanks in part to financing from his Middle East partners.

Other projects are going to have to wait. Mr. Silverstein also plans a 912-foot-tall hotel and condo tower at 99 Church St., on the same block as the Woolworth Building, once financing becomes available. The city has also approved a 1,050-foot-tall tower next to the Museum of Modern Art to be built by Houston-based property giant Hines, but the company said the project's timing hasn't been determined.

Related Cos. and a subsidiary of a Canadian pension fund signed a $1 billion lease with the Metropolitan Transit Authority in May that will allow the partnership to develop a massive complex of residential and commercial buildings west of Penn Station that are planned to be as high as 850 feet. A Related spokeswoman said the developer hopes to start construction as early as 2012.

Before the recession hit, developers Moinian Group and Brookfield Properties Corp. also floated West Side towers, proposed to be more than 1,000 feet tall. "There's not much going on at the moment but it's definitely something we're excited about for the future," a Brookfield spokesman said of the company's project, at Ninth Avenue and 33rd Street.

Moinian wants to build a 1,060-foot office and residential tower nearby, but construction won't start before 2013, a spokesman said.

Buildings such as those could have a greater impact on some well-known views of the Empire State Building than 15 Penn Plaza, City Council Speaker Christine Quinn said. "The idea that nothing is happening on the West Side that has any impact on the Empire State Building views that would allow that postcard to remain frozen in time is not the case," Ms. Quinn said at the press conference. "There are already buildings that the city has acted upon that will go up when the market bears that will change the views from…New Jersey, " she said at the press conference.

If developers do get around to constructing high-rises around the Empire State Building, it "becomes something like the Woolworth Building," said Thomas Hanrahan, dean of the School of Architecture at the Pratt Institute. "It wouldn't diminish or make the Empire State Building any less extraordinary than it already is."

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703618504575459732876001478.html?m od=rss_newyork_real_estate

[Alonzo-ny]

I'm doubtful we will see 5 of the above pictured in the near future.

[bigchet]

Which five would that be. Three are under construction the rest will most likely get started with in five years.

[Alonzo-ny]

The 5 that aren't under construction. 2 of them are more likely than others but the other three I doubt will be complete in ten years.

[infoshare]

Given the current vacancy rate: I would also count on only a few (http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-07-06/office-vacancy-rate-in-u-s-climbs-to-17-year-high-reis-says.html) of those not currently under construction coming to fruition in the next decade. Unless, that is, we somehow can change the current 'Keynesian Economics' course this administration has so wrong-headedly undertaken. So, "economy cooperating (http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-keynesian-economics.htm)"? We will just have to wait and see, I would love to see them all get built - particularly the 'tall & slender' four seasons project.

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-07-06/office-vacancy-rate-in-u-s-climbs-to-17-year-high-reis-says.html

http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-keynesian-economics.htm

[stache]

Let's not forget Rockefeller Center was built during the Depression precisely because construction costs were cheaper during that period.

[ASchwarz]

^
New York has, by far, the lowest office, hotel and residential vacancy rates in the nation, so not sure what sort of point you're making. There's no place with greater need for new space.

The reason there's been a dramatic slowdown here as well as elsewhere is because of lack of market liquidity. It has nothing to do with vacancy rates. Hotels are 90% full, office space is 90%+ full, and residential vacancy rates hover around 2-3%.

[infoshare]

^
There's no place with greater need for new space.



Given the current excess supply as noted (http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-07-06/office-vacancy-rate-in-u-s-climbs-to-17-year-high-reis-says.html) in NYC - regardless of what is going on elsewhere - the weak economy, and all given all the 'inventory' coming with the WTC projects; I would be surprised to see that there will be sufficient demand to build each and every one of those projects. Given those stats, I am not sure why one would think otherwise; that would be the point I am making.

P.S. To boot. I predict that their will be a major 'glut' of vacant office space available at the time the WTC projects are completed. I am talking about five years down-the-road: I admit this is mere speculation, but it seems to me supply is far outstripping current (and projected) demand. Time will tell.

[NoyokA]

So what two or three skyscrapers over 900 feet is damn impressive and much more than most other cities can account for. I feel some people when it comes to their postings are always glass half empty no matter what.

[stache]

What happened with the first Towers, nobody really wanted to work downtown so it took them a long time to become fully occupied.

[Derek2k3]

So what two or three skyscrapers over 900 feet is damn impressive and much more than most other cities can account for. I feel some people when it comes to their postings are always glass half empty no matter what.

Definitely.

And the only one I don't see starting within five years is the Manhattan West project.

[eddhead]

Given the current vacancy rate: I would also count on only a few (http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-07-06/office-vacancy-rate-in-u-s-climbs-to-17-year-high-reis-says.html) of those not currently under construction coming to fruition in the next decade. Unless, that is, we somehow can change the current 'Keynesian Economics' course this administration has so wrong-headedly undertaken.

So, less government spending = higher employment? Go figure....

[steiner]

My guess is that NY will undergo a huge transformation in terms of skyline change. The boom began last decade when towers as BofA, NYTT, Time Warner Center, Bloomberg Tower, Silver Towers, Conde Nast, Barclay Tower, TWT, the former BS World HQ, 7WTC, TS Tower, Random House Tower and other 200m+ buildings went up. Here's a list floating around in several forums, it shows that many companies are looking for new office space:


http://s3.amazonaws.com/trd_three/images/236344/commcharthuge.gif

That's why I think the following towers will be built:
- 1WTC, 100%
- 4WTC, 100%
- 3WTC, I'm pretty sure Silverstein will find a tenant who will satisfy the 20% pre- lease office space.
- 2WTC, the last tower of the complex. I believe that in 2013 we will have a much more improved situation than nowadays. The economy will be strong again, and large companies will seek for new A class office space. So this tower will likely be built to its full height.

- Carnegie 57, 100%
- Beekman Tower, well already done. :)
- 99 Church Street: The site is clear, when Silverstein is able to get the financing, this tower will start immediately.
- 56 Leonard Street: Another tower on hold right now, the site is prepared for construction. Likely to start to rise by next year.

- 15 Penn Station: Recently approved by the City Council, will offer A class office space and a good location. Vornado will find a major tenant, so construction can start.
- Tower Verre: Already approved. Nouvel has to come up with a redesign and Hines needs to back up financing. Again, I'm positive this tower will be built.
- The Girasole: I read an article where it says that this tower will start construction in 2013. The new height is 323m.

- 250 East 57th Street: A big development. Phase I is already U/C, phase II will include a 218m tall tower.

- 50 West Street: Currently on hold, construction could resume by next year.

And so many more. All in all you see that NY's skyline will "drastically" change this decade.

[BBMW]

What we're seeing around the world, and what isn't happening so much in NYC (although the 1 WTC could be considered an exception), is the construction of economically non-viable "statement piece" skyscrapers. Buildings like the Burg Dubai, and possibly even the Petronis Towers, are not likely to ever work from a profitability standpoint. But their bulders and "sponsors" want to grab the worlds tallest building record, no matter what the cost. Notice that these building sit in large empty plazas, so land cost is not driving their height.

Unless some organization, like the Port Authority, wants to make a statement, your not going to see a 2000 footer in NYC, simply because the cost of going that high makes it not an economically viable proposition, unless land costs get astronomical.

[Derek2k3]

Yep.

The most conducive site for a 1400'+ tower is at 450 West 33rd. They can demolish the structure and build about 3msf as-of right.

Don't see this happening for decades though, and I doubt whoever owns it will build just one very tall tower.
Same thing for the Manhattan West site. Brookfield could build one large tower on one side of the site instead of two...

[steiner]

^^ I know what you mean. Dubai, Shanghai and other cities build supertall skyscrapers simply because they can. They (mostly) don't care if the building will be vacant for quite a time or pay off at the end. NYC on the other hand only builds if they are tenants and they know for sure that the new office space will be filled. NY has lost this spirit "we build tall because we can", I don't know maybe because NY doesn't have to show the world that it's important and powerful. Other upcoming cities have to prove themselves, and what's better qualified for that job than building a massive skyscraper? One could say all those cities have a kind of minority complex, they constantly need and seek for attention.

[BBMW]

^
I think NY may be right and the other cities wrong. Why build an skyscraper you know is going to be empty. I think the Burg Dubai will end up being an ironic joke.

[WizardOfOss]

Buildings like the Burj Dubai (and Burj Al Arab, the Palm Islands and all of the other crazy stuff they built) have put Dubai firmly on the map, both for tourism and business. Only ten years ago hardly anyone in the world had ever heard of Dubai, now everyone knows it. That alone was probably worth the construction costs. Doesn't matter if it's empty forever. The Petronas Towers did the same thing for KL. Not what I would call a joke. It's just built for another purpose.

[stache]

Plus Manhattan is too close to airports for anything that tall.

[SouthSky]

^
I think NY may be right and the other cities wrong. Why build an skyscraper you know is going to be empty. I think the Burg Dubai will end up being an ironic joke.

I don't think that's true. Looking back at the original post of this thread, this is answered by the fact that the Empire State Building had the very same criticisms made against it as the the Burj Khalifa in Dubai does today (e.i, "Empty State Building" that after being ridiculed went on to define New York for two generations). And, when reading the articles attached to the original link (http://www.ultrapolisproject.com/ultrapolis_017.htm), the suggestion seems to be that what New York is or is not doing today as compared to other cities is a reflection of something else that is actually important. Recently I've read articles quoting New York councilmen claiming that New York can tax more and charge more because of its 'cache.' Sounds like image translates to actual benefits. But I do also agree, that there's nothing wrong with not being the biggest and the baddest. But let me tell you this. My next vacation will be in Dubai and not New York, because I want to see the biggest and the baddest (of course, I will always love and come back to New York, though).

[BBMW]

Because of when, why, and where it was built, the ESB has always been, other than a tourist attraction, something of a white elephant.

I would like to see an economically viable 2000 footer built in NYC, but I can't see it happening any thime soon.

As far as Dubai, the entire city is a white elephant. Abu Dhabi is propping it up financially for the moment, but we'll have to see how long that lasts.


I don't think that's true. Looking back at the original post of this thread, this is answered by the fact that the Empire State Building had the very same criticisms made against it as the the Burj Khalifa in Dubai does today (e.i, "Empty State Building" that after being ridiculed went on to define New York for two generations). And, when reading the articles attached to the original link (http://www.ultrapolisproject.com/ultrapolis_017.htm), the suggestion seems to be that what New York is or is not doing today as compared to other cities is a reflection of something else that is actually important. Recently I've read articles quoting New York councilmen claiming that New York can tax more and charge more because of its 'cache.' Sounds like image translates to actual benefits. But I do also agree, that there's nothing wrong with not being the biggest and the baddest. But let me tell you this. My next vacation will be in Dubai and not New York, because I want to see the biggest and the baddest (of course, I will always love and come back to New York, though).

[lofter1]

... let me tell you this. My next vacation will be in Dubai and not New York, because I want to see the biggest and the baddest ...


Take lots of cash and a nice handkerchief to keep the sand out of your mouth.

[BStyles]

I love the arguments over why NY needs a 2000 footer. You guys keep saying BUILD, BUILD, BUILD!!!! Me, and a majority of the economists are asking these questions:

-Who's funding?
-Who's leasing?
-Who's willing to work at those heights?
-Geographically, what are the positive/negative effects on New York's skyline?(I doubt there will be any observation decks, which raises another reason why it shouldn't be built)
-How will it help the economy?
-How will this attract tenants as opposed to the dozens of other projects stalled from completion?
-And how long will it sit empty until said lease?

This is why the PA isn't so keen on building Tower 2. Until those questions are answered, I don't ever want to see a 2000 footer in New York, because there is a huge difference between a WANT and a NEED.