i believe houston lost a title...

[pm91]

i read yesturday in an article (some of yall may already know this) but Nshville is building the 1,057 ft. tall Signature Tower. this will make it the tallest in the country outside of New York and Chicago. Houston currently still holds that title with the 1,002 ft tall JP Morgan Chase building. but when Signature Tower is completed wwe wont have that title anymore. So why hasnt Houston built a taller building than JP in over 25 years or so???

[TheNiche]

i read yesturday in an article (some of yall may already know this) but Nshville is building the 1,057 ft. tall Signature Tower. this will make it the tallest in the country outside of New York and Chicago. Houston currently still holds that title with the 1,002 ft tall JP Morgan Chase building. but when Signature Tower is completed wwe wont have that title anymore. So why hasnt Houston built a taller building than JP in over 25 years or so???

Nope, LA beat us out of that and the title for the tallest building west of the Mississippi with the completion of Library Tower quite a while back.

The better question is probably not so much why Houston hasn't had a taller building built (remember, cities don't actually build things), but why one was built in Nashville.

[Pumapayam]

I want more tall buildings too.

But they keep removing stories with each update, example being that Galleria Turnberry Condo.

Houston projects get these outrageous plans, then they get all conservative and shrink it cut because of budget concerns.

[pm91]

oh i forgot the library tower. ive never liked that building. see thats the thing, i dont understand why nashville. or why people wont go taller than 500 ft. downtown since the early 80s (with 2 exceptions)

[Houston19514]

i read yesturday in an article (some of yall may already know this) but Nshville is building the 1,057 ft. tall Signature Tower. this will make it the tallest in the country outside of New York and Chicago. Houston currently still holds that title with the 1,002 ft tall JP Morgan Chase building. but when Signature Tower is completed wwe wont have that title anymore. So why hasnt Houston built a taller building than JP in over 25 years or so???

Does anyone know if they have started building this Signature Tower?

[pm91]

yeah they've started to build it. by any chance can someone update emporis?

[GovernorAggie]

Nope, LA beat us out of that and the title for the tallest building west of the Mississippi with the completion of Library Tower quite a while back.

The better question is probably not so much why Houston hasn't had a taller building built (remember, cities don't actually build things), but why one was built in Nashville.

And Atlanta beat us with the Bank of America Tower, and Cleveland's not far behind with Key Bank Tower.

[MidtownCoog]

Houston may suffer from "do they like me syndrome", but not "little man syndrome".

[Houston19514]

And Atlanta beat us with the Bank of America Tower, and Cleveland's not far behind with Key Bank Tower.

Chase Tower: 305 meters

Key Bank: 289 meters

That's a pretty substantial difference. Key Bank Tower would be the third tallest building in Houston.

[Houston19514]

yeah they've started to build it. by any chance can someone update emporis?

Are you sure about that? May I inquire as to your source?

"Rumor is Signature Tower (Downtown Nashville)

[sevfiv]

nothing new on their site, either...

http://www.signaturetowernashville.com/media.php

[KinkaidAlum]

Don't forget that many of the taller structures are spired/crowned. Several of Atlanta's tallest, Cleveland's tallest, Nashville's Signature Tower, Mobile's new tallest, etc... all have far fewer occupied floors than Houston's tallest towers.

[Mark F. Barnes]

I really don't understand this preoccupation with having the tallest building. The buildings don't make the city, the people make the city. If living in a city with the tallest skyscrapers was so great, why are so many poeple moving here from NYC and Chi-town and all other points of the world? I'd much rather see them sink a billion dollars in restoring the great old neighborhoods around downtown. Sink some money in the Heights, or the original neighborhoods (Wards) that built Houston from the ground up. Who gives a she-it if Houston has another skyscraper in excess of 1000 ft.

[Trae]

Don't forget that many of the taller structures are spired/crowned. Several of Atlanta's tallest, Cleveland's tallest, Nashville's Signature Tower, Mobile's new tallest, etc... all have far fewer occupied floors than Houston's tallest towers.

Atlanta tallest is only 55 stories.

[pm91]

yeah sure people make the city but the thing is about buildings is that it is like an identity for the city. the first thing i think about when i think about new york, los angeles, chicago, miami, etc. is the city skyline. skylines are like the fingerprints for citys. they give that city its distinct and unique identity. so haveing a 1000+ ft tall tower will increase and improve the identity as would many lower highrises like mainplace and one park place. people actually do pay attention to skylines because it is the way the city can try to make a first good impression for the people who havent seen it before. if you seen an ugly crappy skyline that is how you think the rest of the city is. i think i have made my point.

[Houston19514]

yeah sure people make the city but the thing is about buildings is that it is like an identity for the city. the first thing i think about when i think about new york, los angeles, chicago, miami, etc. is the city skyline. skylines are like the fingerprints for citys. they give that city its distinct and unique identity. so haveing a 1000+ ft tall tower will increase and improve the identity as would many lower highrises like mainplace and one park place. people actually do pay attention to skylines because it is the way the city can try to make a first good impression for the people who havent seen it before. if you seen an ugly crappy skyline that is how you think the rest of the city is. i think i have made my point.

No source for your construction information regarding the Signature Tower in Nashville?

[Trae]

The Signature Tower is still a proposal. Many Nashville residents on SSP said it may be shrinking in size.

[Mark F. Barnes]

yeah they've started to build it. by any chance can someone update emporis?

The Signature Tower is still a proposal. Many Nashville residents on SSP said it may be shrinking in size.

Thanks for the update Trae

http://www.signaturetowernashville.com/

Construction of the building itself has been delayed until half of the 400 residential apartment units have been sold.

Must be having trouble selling the the half million dollar veiw of the Cumberland River. "Dreams might not come true"

[Metro Matt]

Crowns, spires, & antennae aren't a real way to determine how tall a building really is, if that were the case then Houston would have two 1000+ ft towers.

[Drerx8]

Nope--they havent started building it -- I'm in school in Nashville--and the height may be reduced.

[SecondTour]

If living in a city with the tallest skyscrapers was so great, why are so many poeple moving here from NYC.......

Because my wife doesn't dig the cold weather. Otherwise, that's where I'd still be.

Back on topic - maybe potential occupancy has something to do with it. Having several buildings in the 80 story range is a lot to ask of a city who

[Gary]

Screw building height, gimme infill.

[strickn]

A skyscraper enjoyer for half my life, I am becoming less and less convinced of their value. Do they tend to be built where value has already been created, and then calcify it? Sure they can contain concentrated population for lively environments in the surrounding blocks, but whether those happen or not has already occurred independently of the high-rises: having dense population onboard amounts to nothing more than vertical cul-de-sacs (instead of horizontal) unless there is a local gradation of layered spatial uses between just the absolutely public and the absolutely private, to promote activity and give people a place and a likeable, natural reason to change their routine and go outside. Meanwhile examples abound of neighborhoods where having skyscrapers alone did nothing for urbanistic quality, containing business while livelihood rotted away around the bones. In urban socioeconomic scene, let's focus our affection on more flexible components that promote what Houston is good at. Glass crystals are a manifestation of some kinds of success but may not be contributing to it! Chances are that a healthy city life will roll farther on the momentum of minor investments that are adaptable by regular people for use in new work. I would be happy to see fewer high-rises as part of that.Returning to what Houston is good at, that we would do well to target and support:Infill as such is fine, but I want to caution that condo infill often makes neighborhoods much less flexible. Young urban professional homeowners are bent on property value appreciation. They don't want those light industrial operations behind their new development to even stay in business, much less expand. This matters.

Neil

I'd rather that the thread took off in this new direction. However, to address the thread starter pm91, rather than just Gary and company, I'll throw in that Houston does have a better title that cannot be lost - world's first 1,000-foot skyscraper outside Manhattan and Chicago.

[MidtownCoog]

Because my wife doesn't dig the cold weather.

aka "The Woman Who Wears the Pants".

[pm91]

when i made this topic i was misunderstood by myself. i knew that we had the first but for some reason i thought it was still that way. after the niche told me we havent had it for a while i was like "oh ok, oops." and people just kept on posting...

anyways, why do they count spires and crownes for height when it really is exactly part of the building? (i know i worded it wrong, hopefully someone understands what im trying to say)

[strickn]

'They' count crowns and spires for height because they are manmade features that rise away from the ground. However, so do antennas. 'They' have decided not to count antennas as architecturally integrated into the building*, which is their decision (not that anybody appointed them to speak for anybody), but 'they' are not consistent, as in the case of One Shell Plaza, where the mast (according to the building's engineer, Joseph Colaco) has not been an antenna for a decade but has been kept as a feature of the building, yet it's still not 'counted' as such. Many people who aren't "council on tall buildings" experts quite rightly think that if you've got it standing up without wires, then it is architectural. That's why, in my own listings, I use a distinction. I list height and I list building size. Any manmade feature (have some fun and look up Torre Guinigi in Lucca, Italy, for an example of non-manmade!), including flagpoles and broadcasting masts is part of the real height. But for building size, I figure out the square-footage of surface at every top surface of the building and multiply it by its height. For angled towers, this can take a while, but it gives an exactly accurate profile of their size in the city, and is the only method that makes it possible to correctly compare skylines like Atlanta, where almost every building has a sharp taper above the top floor, and Houston, where almost every building has a flat roof above its top floor.

Neil

*neither, however, are mechanical penthouses, like on the roof of Wells Fargo Plaza and innumerable other towers, and yet they clearly are part of the height of the building...

[editor]

Screw building height, gimme infill.

Height brings infill.

Look at Sears Tower, John Hancock Center, the former World Trade Center in New York, that old ugly stripey tower in London (can't remember the name), the Library Tower in L.A., the BoAT in Seattle, etc...

In most cases, when you build a skyscraper that's out of proportion to its surroundings, developers come in and build smaller towers around it. Having a signature tower drives up property values surrounding it, allowing developers to bankroll bigger buildings.

[strickn]

Height brings infill.

Look at Sears Tower, John Hancock Center, the former World Trade Center in New York, that old ugly stripey tower in London (can't remember the name), the Library Tower in L.A., the BoAT in Seattle, etc...

In most cases, when you build a skyscraper that's out of proportion to its surroundings, developers come in and build smaller towers around it. Having a signature tower drives up property values surrounding it, allowing developers to bankroll bigger buildings.

In all of the cases you cited, the taxing authorities had funneled, subsidized (LA, from what I heard, set out to heavily incentivize high-rise construction downtown out of a desire to have an 'urban' skyline to represent itself - just look how often it appears in TeeVee and movies since the nineties) demand into those areas, or gone in on the project altogether (World Trade Center). Skyscrapers usually show where there is money to be made, and I think you're basically wrong on the causality you believe in. I recently made a table of all the major towers outside American downtowns, starting with the Statue of Liberty and including every subsequent building at least as tall (>305'). Greater Houston had around seventy. Metropolitan Chicago had, I think, one. You would be correct if you said that central business districts, when they're large enough, benefit to some extent from a 'bonus' effect of having the critical mass to be a place that's good to locate more business. But more often than not, they get there because high-rise construction has been zoned away from the rest of the city.

[jfre81]

Rather than tall I'd prefer distinctive. My favorite buildings in Houston are not the tallest. It's cool to go up to the observation deck at JP but I prefer buildings like BOA and Gulf. Those are the buildings that tell me I'm looking at Houston. No need for a 1,500-foot sore thumb.

[toxtethogrady]

I really don't understand this preoccupation with having the tallest building.

Ask Dubai...