Talk:Willis Tower

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"Stokie"

The lawsuit section references the village of "Stokie". I think this may refer to Skokie, since after clicking the Stokie link, surprised at this gap in my Chicagoland knowledge, I was taken to a page about a London borough.

Team-B-Vital Improvement Drive

Hello all!

This article has been chosen as this fortnight's effort for WP:Discord's #team-b-vital channel, a collaborative effort to bring Vital articles up to a B class if possible, similar to WP:Articles for Improvement. This effort will run for up to a fortnight, ending early if the article is felt to be at B-class or impossible to further improve. Articles are chosen by a quick vote among interested chatters, with the goal of working together on interesting Vital articles that need improving.

Thank you! Remagoxer ^(talk) 16:19, 3 September 2022 (UTC)

ZIP code

Some sources say that "...the building boasts its own zip code (60606)." This is factually incorrect: other buildings also reside in zip code 60606. , for example 100 S Canal st, Chicago IL (see https://tools.usps.com/zip-code-lookup.htm?byaddress). -- Wesha (talk) 21:06, 2 October 2022 (UTC)

1973 or 1974

The second sentence says it was completed in 1974, and under “General Information” it also says 1974. However “Record Height” and “History” (“Topping-out and completion”) both say 1973. The building’s own website (https://www.willistower.com/) says 1973. Rb624 (talk) 21:40, 4 November 2022 (UTC)

I think there is a slight distinction here. The first Sears employees began moving into the tower during the weekend of September 9, 1973. However, some work on the building continued through 1974. – Epicgenius (talk) 22:13, 4 November 2022 (UTC)

What about the CN tower?

The CN tower was built in the 70s and was the world's tallest building for a while. I think there is a lot that's factually wrong with this article. 70.24.149.45 (talk) 14:10, 7 November 2022 (UTC)

I don't think there's anything that's factually wrong with this article. The CN Tower is not considered a building by the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH) or Emporis, according to the tower's own article. The Willis Tower#Height section of this article also mentions the distinction between "tallest building" and "tallest structure". – Epicgenius (talk) 15:12, 7 November 2022 (UTC)

The CN tower was the world's tallest free standing structure, not the world's tallest building, due to the fact that most floors on the building are inhabitable. Piemadd (talk) 12:51, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Requested move 19 September 2023

Willis Tower → Sears Tower – This was discussed 14 years ago, and I think it is worth revisiting after 14 years, because:

1) The decision (to move to Willis Tower) was pretty poor I think, and was apparently based bigly on bad-faith shenanigans on the part of the Willis Tower folks.

2) On the merits, forgetting the doleful previous close, it is hard to tell which is currently the more common name, for me anyway, at this time, but I'm for sticking with Sears

The first point (corrupted previous discussion) isn't really germane, I bring it up mainly to quash any "it's been decided" nonsense. It is the second point -- the merits -- that matters. So let's talk about that. Herostratus (talk) 04:53, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

(FWIW -- and its not worth much of anything -- the 2009 discussions and RM are in the first three threads of Talk:Willis Tower/Archive 2.) Herostratus (talk)

Survey

• Support as nominator. Executive summary: Google Ngrams supports Sears Tower, Google Trends supports Willis Tower; I see it as about tied. My vote goes to "Sears Tower", because reasons.

As far as books goes, Google Ngrams are usually a strong point in figuring these things out, and this google Ngram shows Sears Tower still more common in books to this day. Yes the trend seems that Willis Tower is gaining, and maybe by 2035 or so will take the lead -- but I've seen trends reverse before. And while trends can matter some, the area between the lines matters more -- the total amount of still-circulating material favors Sear Tower by a very large margin. And this area continues to grew, albeit more slowly. Ngrams aren't everything, but they are a strong data point.

Books aside, what about non-book media such as web sites, newspapers, and magazines? I don't know, and if there's a way to get hard data I don't know what it is. There's stuff, here is a pretty recent article in Chicago magazine which seems to indicate that Sears Tower is still common in Chicago anyway, but c'mon, that's quite possibly just one writer who needs to justify his title ("Chicagoans Refuse to Call These Places by Their Real Names") and means very little, and data is not the plural of anecdote. So I'm not considering this for now.

All that aside, what about what the average Joe and Jane calls it? This is pretty hard to know objectively, but we do have this Google Trends chart which shows Willis beating Sears 72 to 47 over the last year, per week. That is 60-40. That's America, but worldwide its the same. (It show more searches per week on the Sear/Willis Tower in America than in the whole world including America, so maybe I'm reading this wrong.) OTOH the recent threads that came up for me -- Reddit, Quora -- asking "what do you call it" skew Sears, but those may be consistently self-selecting groups, I dunno. It's a data point in my mind.

So, for hard data, Google Ngrams vs Google Trends. My vote is for keeping "Sears Tower", a couple reasons being that after all its been 14 years and Willis still hasn't caught on that much. 14 years is a long time for that. Old names sticking does happen. The (1947) John Hancock Tower was renamed to Berkeley Building at least half a century ago ago, but is still universally called the Old John Hancock Tower. This is way past "stubborn old people" territory and into "parents teaching their children and so on down thru the generations" territory. We don't know if that's what's going on with the Sears/Willis tower. Might be. So I'm not super willing to go off into the weeds of what might happen in the future (a big argument in the previous RM was that Willis would surely soon become the more common name by far, which shows the limits of guessing ahead). And, to me, the current legit name is Sears Tower (the 2009 change was not legit IMO), and I'm not seeing the data to indicate a change at this time. Herostratus (talk) 04:53, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose per MOS:RETAIN. After fourteen years, I would imagine we've got it right. I would imagine that the name "Willis Tower" is reflected in reliable news sources, even if not by ngrams.estar8806 (talk) ★ 11:59, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

MOS:RETAIN is about which version of English to use. Unless you're arguing that it's called "Willis Tower" in American English but "Sears Tower" in British English, MOS:RETAIN does not apply here. Rreagan007 (talk) 14:10, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

Retaining the existing name in close cases is a legit point. Since the legit name of the article is Sears Tower, let's keep at that. I mean anyone can blow off WP:RM and make unilateral moves and claim WP:BRD trumps that, then refuse to follow BRD also and instead move-war, claim an edit war, and get the article protected at its new name, forum-shop (it was claimed anyway) and hoodwink the closer into deciding "leave at Willis Tower" (emphasis added), but what really does that have to do with what we're trying to do here? Is that how you suggest moves be made in future? I could do it myself right now -- move war and get the article protected at Sears Tower and put the burden on you to make the case for a change. Shall I? Herostratus (talk) 18:09, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

"Since the legit name of the article is Sears Tower, let's keep at that." Um, excuse me? The article has been at the stable title Willis Tower since 2009, because a 2009 RM found that "Willis Tower" is the consensus WP:COMMONNAME. That was a long time ago, and new arguments can be made in this RM; but unilaterally moving the article back to Sears Tower right now is not something that is supported by any Wikipedia policy. 162 etc. (talk) 18:44, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

Alright. I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on that. Even supposing you were right, it's been 14 years so a fresh look on the merits is worthwhile. Let's see what other people have to say on the merits. Herostratus (talk) 16:44, 21 September 2023 (UTC)

I think what was meant was WP:TITLECHANGES. -BRAINULATOR9 (TALK) 23:44, 21 September 2023 (UTC)

Don't move it. that isnt its name anymore, and we all have to accept that. Otherwise you are just perpetuating the problemThatCheeseGuy (talk) 14:43, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

What problem? Re"that isnt its name anymore", ^{[citation needed]} since you seem to be asserting a fact. Herostratus (talk) 18:09, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose when I do a Google search for "tallest building in Chicago", the results are about 50-50 between "Willis Tower" and "Willis Tower (originally known as Sears Tower)". Willis Tower has been the official name for over a decade, and the nominator notes the majority of searches are for that term. I see no reason whatsoever to go back to an old name; the argument that the article should revert to Sears Tower if there is no consensus because a 14-year-old RM discussion was unsatisfactory to the nominator is also wrong. 217.180.228.138 (talk) 03:28, 24 September 2023 (UTC)