NEW YORK | 1 & 2 Manhattan West | 995 + 935 FT | 67 + 56 FLOORS


Credit: GaryHershorn

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So infuriating that some of the LEDs are out already! Why do so many new towers seem to botch the night lighting? The LEDs on the Bloomberg and BoA towers seem to work fine despite being over a decade old. So why the issues on newer towers like this, 1 & 4 WTC, etc?

Photo from TheJabberTech on Twitter via NYGuy on SSP

^btw those are some really nice night shots even though the first thing I noticed was the busted lights lol

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It boggles the mind. They spend so much money on building high quality towers, but by the time they get to the lighting it’s like they’re running on dimes.

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CPT and 4 WTC be like to 1 Manhattan West: “First time?”

Meanwhile, 111 West 57th Street is still waiting for its lighting :sweat_smile:

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Egh, you can’t really use One Bryant Park and Bloomberg Tower’s lighting as an exception to faulty lighting schemes found throughout the city @DeSelby because both of those towers are using backlit translucent glass for their crowns so it’s more difficult to see if there are any broken elements from close up and afar.

It’s just super evident in this case because they are just straight strips with the lighting element clearly visible to the eye. I think it was on the 3WTC or 1 WTC thread that I last mentioned this but it’s just so hard to tell what could be causing the issue because there’s so many different things that could be causing the problems in a tower to tower case, because I’d find it hard to believe that the same problem is occurring in each case.

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I’ve seen 1BP lights get pretty messed up looking sometimes, it’s not visible unless you are at Bryant park looking up close. The key is that they take it seriously to replace lights quickly, probably because BofA wouldn’t tolerate Durst slacking on maintenance. It also gets fully window washed at least once, sometimes twice a year.
Overall, NYC facade lighting is atrocious. The contrast between NY and Washington DC is extremely stark— in DC facade lighting is extremely common downtown, and almost always in perfect maintenance. Maybe it’s something about accessing these lights in high locations that makes property managers slack off in NY

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Well I mean yeah, that is one of the reasons because they are not in easily accessible locations, considering you’re comparing a city with almost no tall buildings to one with hundreds. There’s definitely a difference in bmu’s being used to wash a building vs actual maintenance work (like replacing light fixtures/replacing damaged window panels, etc.

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Will 33rd be closed just between 7th and 8th or will it stretch to 9th under the new Penn Station plan?

It will be nice when this is a tree-filled plaza.

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They should close it all the way from Penn to the High Line.

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The current plan is only for a small portion of 33rd between 7th and 8th Ave to be closed, not the full stretch, called Plaza 33 in the area of the new Gateway Entrance to the right of PENN 2.

But in general 33rd from 7th to 9th will become a shared thoroughway for pedestrians and vehicles, of course geared more towards pedestrians.

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That’s what I thought. Hopefully, they’ll landscape the whole stretch to Ninth even if it’s just shared space

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That’s the plan :+1: The street will be paved/combined with the sidewalks and bollards and tree planters will just make up the boundary for vehicles. This also includes 6th to 7th Ave.

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That will look amazing. What do they mean by shared streets though? That corner of 33rd and 9th looks completely pedestrianized.

But for the bollards and tree planters, otherwise it would be only pedestrian, that’s why they are there.

It’s shared in the manner that delivery vehicles will have access to the street and most likely vendor and food trucks. If you look closely you can see the curb cut in the sidewalk and the obvious opening between the crossing islands.

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Thanks. That’s going to look amazing. I wish that they’d do that to more streets than just 33rd.

Did you say that the shared street will go all the way to Sixth? If so, the north side of the 15 Penn should be very nice.

@robertwalpole Yeah, I believe it’s planned to go that far to join up with the proposed pedestrianization of Herald Sq and the updating of it’s subway station.

It seems like all recent photos show that the construction canopy between the towers is fully gone, makes the space seem so open now.

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This is going to be impressive.

You’re a great contributor, TKDV. You know your stuff.

Speaking of great contributors, I wonder what happened to Xing.

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He’s still around, just not posting anymore/as often because uni is in session.

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