The Empire State Building was built as the world’s tallest building, making it instantly iconic. This 700 ft building and 262 fifth would hold no title or serve any purpose boosting the image of the city. They would only cover what might be considered the world’s most recognizable building. How can that be a good thing? Would Paris build a 700 foot or 1050 ft structure across the street from the Eiffel Tower? I know they have Torre Montparmasse, but it is dozens of blocks away not 3.
My statement is to say if the Empire State Building is covered up, so be it. But there needs to be another landmark tower to replace it that can exhibit the same distinction as the Empire State Building does, especially height wise.
It is the worlds most iconic skyscraper, not building. I don’t see what a title has to do with anything, if I built a skyscraper at 827 meters it wouldn’t be the tallest in the world but there’s no denying it would have an impact.
No Paris wouldn’t. But if you remember when it was built nobody in Paris wanted the effiel tower either.
Maybe there does need to be another Landmark building. But it’s unlikely one would be built. The only thing would probably be a megatall or the metro north project or something like that.
The essential factor in NYC is making money. Everything else is secondary.
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That would suck if the KPF tower is only 700 ft. The BIG tower was more in the 850-900 ft. range. I hope this is a supertall.
I also don’t understand the whining about the ESB. That landmark is nearly 100 years old. Since when do we need to freeze Midtown in amber bc of the ESB? It looks better now that it has context, and isn’t just sitting alone. The fact that it was alone was an accident of history (Depression, then WW2, then lower Midtown declined in the postwar decades).
I’m ok with a very nice 700’ design. 260 5th will be around 1,100’, and it looks ridiculous.
I think with the switch from BIG to KPF the result will be a taller, more slender tapering tower akin to Madison Square Park Tower aka 45 E 22nd. Especially if they go residential, then all bets are off.
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Does BIG like fatter towers?
yes. Even his residential buildings are grandiose. See the Pyramid and his works overseas.
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Could be a landmark supertall here, per Crawford
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I wonder what this means for the developmentn restart? New different tower?
Van Barton now owns the site after successfully foreclosing it. They said that they’ve retained KPF to design a different tower.
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Cool. So we could see something large here then. In the article it talks about that their used to be plans for a 64 story tower here.
I think that a 900’+ tower is very feasable.
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It wouldn’t be that spectacular considering this tower would rise right infront of that view. I think the views from “this” tower would be the spactular ones, though I believe the use has been changed to commercial from residential. Eitherway, I’m sure KPF will produce something beautiful.
That’s true.
Godot? We’re waiting…
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