Talk:Willis Tower

Miscellaneous comments

I have no idea if I'm going to mess this page up or not (first time posting anything here....) But 3.8 million square feet != 418,064 square meters I don't know which is correct but the math is clearly wrong.

The number of stories appears to differ between this page (110) and others. 50 Tallest buildings in the U.S. and Worlds tallest structures say 108. —Mulad 03:26, 4 Jan 2004 (UTC)

It is 110 stories per http://www.thesearstower.com/.

Just fyi, some sources count basement levels, while others only count levels above ground. This is why you see a variation. Most do not count parking levels, however (although I'm sure some do). --Quasipalm 19:39, 11 October 2005 (UTC)

Finally someone got it right regarding the ludicrousness of assigning "world's tallest" title to the other buildings.

Since we have a picture of the Hancock Building from the Sears Tower, would there be a problem if I posted a personal PD picture of the Sears Tower from the Hancock Building? Just to get a visual reference between the two? BrianL03 08:22, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)

• Yours would be even better probably. --Golbez 15:39, Jun 6, 2005 (UTC)

• Dude, your desire to contribute to Wikipedia is not a "problem". It's why Wikipedia exists! ---Isaac R 03:08, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)

• • I've posted the picture online here.BrianL03

This article lists the height at 520 m, yet the Taipai as surpassing it, even though that is only 508/509 m high. Explain? - Guest - Trauma

The height to the tip of the taller antenna is 527 m, but the antennae are not considered an integral part of the building. The height is only taken to the rooftop, which is 442.14 meters. The correct height of Taipei 101 is 509 meters, by the way... 508 is an error resulting from mismeasurement. There are a couple of reasons antennae do not count in the official height -- one is that they change all the time and including them would make height rankings unstable (they're considered more like furniture than structure); another is that most tall buildings have some form of antenna or lightning rod, and since these are not shown on blueprints it would be almost impossible to get height listings beyond the very tallest buildings. Montalto 22:17, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

More sections needed

I've broken out the "tallest building" material and a paragraph on the sky deck into sections. But there's still too much random material in the first part. If anybody sees any basis for additional sections, be bold. ----Isaac R 03:05, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)

• I went ahead and added a "history" section with a bunch of information from research I have done. ... duh! didn't know how to sign my name. Gws57 21:59, Jun 15, 2005 (UTC)
  • Great stuff! Really improves the article. But don't forget to sign your talk page entrees with a ~~~~, which gets expanded to your name and a date stamp.. ----Isaac R 21:45, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Sears Tower Picture

I think the new picture from User:Bmicomp is actually less clear than the old one. It's partially obscured by another building and the contrast with the sky makes the Tower look like a giant black blob. The old picture, I thought, was clear and showed window detail. At the very least it wasn't obscured by another building. Maybe we can include both shots. Any thoughts? Gws57 July 6, 2005 15:46 (UTC)

• Yeah, you have a point, it is quite obscured. The other one looked a bit dark though. Feel free to change it back. -- BMIComp (talk) 6 July 2005 15:58 (UTC)

• The new picture has quite horrific lens distortion that makes the building in front look curved; also, it's not perspective corrected, so it looks like it gets thinner at the top. Nohat 6 July 2005 18:41 (UTC)

• It's also more a picture of the building in front of it, impressive in its own right, than the Sears Tower. --Golbez July 6, 2005 18:43 (UTC)

• Points well taken. I reverted it to the previous version. -- BMIComp (talk) 7 July 2005 02:10 (UTC)

The orthogonal version of the Sears Tower photo is well-intended, but I don't think it's an improvement. The original version had some perspective distortion, but at least the building still looked tall; now it looks kind of squashed. The current version is not a good representation of how the building looks in real life. Any objection to changing it back? (Full disclosure: I'm the one who posted the original version.) Image:Sears_tower_orthogonal.jpg vs Image:SearsTower.jpg -- BenMiller 23:16, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

• I prefer the orthogonal version, myself. However, it does look like it was squashed a little in the process. I wonder if we can fix that to make it look more like it really looks orthogonally. --Quasipalm 16:15, 24 October 2005 (UTC)

• If somone wants to create a better orthogonal version, that's fine with me, although I'd argue that if that's what we want, an illustration would be better than a photo. I don't have the software to do it, and until/unless someone does, I'd like to change the picture back. Currently users get the Sears Tower as seen in a funhouse mirror. BenMiller 19:47, 27 October 2005 (UTC)

• I really think the current photo needs to be changed. It is too long and it screws up the formatting. I think we could find a better main picture. Take a look at Image:Sears Tower ss.jpg it cleans every thing up and is also nice shot of the building. Ryan J Pasch 00:01, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Petronas Towers

Please, stop changing the building that surpasses the Sears Tower as the world's tallest as the Petronas Towers. If you read the infobox, it clearly states that it is talking about highest habitable structure by roof-top, by which account the sears tower is clearly taller. --Quasipalm 22:03, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

terror threat

I added a little section about the terror threat. It is not much.

Either it can be completely removed (i followed the be bold policy) or it can be expanded by others.

Regardless as to whether or not the section stays, I really think the reference to Oplan Bojinka should stay (as it shows the importance of this building and the risk) and the same has now been done with the US Bank building in LA after president Bush's statement about the foiled hijacking plan.

Evilbu 21:07, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

Honestly, I'm not thrilled about adding a "Terror threat" section to every major landmark in the US. Earlier today I added "however some counter-terrorism experts have expressed doubt that the plot was ever fully developed or likely to occur" to US Bank Tower after reading a report in the LA Times. I guess my concern is that these "foiled terror plots" are so politically charged that it's hard to tell what's fact and what's political fiction. --Quasipalm 21:55, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

I'll refrain from childishness so I will not just put it back on again as it seems I have a majority against me. But still I'd like to point out that what I said (regardless of whether or not it is true or implies that it was gonna happen if authorities didn't intervene) is backed up by http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oplan_Bojinka Evilbu 22:20, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

It says that was a possible plan. I have possible plans too, but they never got close to executing that part of the plan. I don't think we need to be told that the tallest building in the hemisphere is an "important building". --Golbez 22:30, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

Floor Space / Window Space ratio

I reverted a short edit made by Redneb regarding floor space / window space. Not only did the edit go against all the research I had ever seen about smaller floor sizes having more availible window space for smaller tenant firms, but I worked out the math:

• Floors 1-49 have 56.25 square feet of floor space per linear foot of window space.
• Floors 50-65 have 43.75.
• Floors 66-89 have 31.23.
• Floors 90-110 have 25 square feet of floor space per linear foot of window space.

As the floors go up, the amount of window space increases relative to the decrease in floor size. If anything, the article should be edited to reflect this. Gws57 16:43, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

Well, I clearly had my ratio flipped around- so please revert back, with flipped ratio (Higher Window/Floor Space). Thanks. Redneb 19:03, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

Done and done. How do you like it? Gws57 22:40, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

Windows broken in windstorm?

I remember that in March of 1988, a bunch of the window glass on the top floors broke due to some kind of freak windstorm, causing the glass to fall to the street. I remember this because I was in town then, and the top floors of the building looked intredibly post-apocalyptic. But I can't find any articles that describe why and how this happened. Anyone have any ideas? Jkonrath 20:40, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

I was living there at the time and, while I was only ten, I remember that too. What you're suggesting would be kind of difficult. The best way to do it would be to try to remember what month this happened, and then get access to an archive of one of the local papers (the Chicago Tribune or the or the Chicago Sun-Times} to see if they wrote about it - I'm sure both of them did. Then cite that article in WP.Azlib77 11:13, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Rendering

This page is not rendering well with my browser Firefox 1.5.0.3. The picture of the building in the history section has content text behind it.

June 22, 2006 Arrests

An enterprising unregisterd, 67.22.216.150, added information on the June 22, 2006 arrest of seven men charged with plotting to bomb the Sears Tower as well as the FBI building in Miami. This resulted in the resurrection of the "terrorist target" subheading, which I don't object to as it now appears to have been a terrorist target. At any rate, I cleaned up and clarified some of their information, marked it as a current event, and started this topic to discuss anything related to these arrests. --jonny-mt 04:36, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

I'm a bit concerned about every possible terror target in America getting a section on terror. I'm thinking of the "uncovered plot" to destroy the US Bank Tower in LA. First off, there seems to be little evidence that these people were ever capable of doing anything beyond taking pictures and bragging to friends about their plots. Secondly, there is main stream speculation that these sorts of stories pop up as part of political theater. Thoughts? -Quasipalm 15:28, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

They talked to an FBI informant about purchasing guns, bombs, and other assorted Weapons of Building Destruction. Sounds like they were pretty serious to me; they just got cut off in the early stages. Obviously this news story is very good for the Bush administration, but speculation is not criteria for section deletion. Supadawg (talk • contribs) 22:01, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

CN Tower comparison

I don't get this comparison in the article:

"For comparison, Toronto's CN Tower, built in 1976, cost around the equivalent of US$260 million in 2005 dollars."

These are two very different structures i don't see the correlation between the two in terms of cost comparisons. one is an office building the other a telecommunications tower/toursit attraction. Duhon

Black nationalist reference

132.241.246.63 (talk · contribs) insists the men were Black nationalists. Where is this found? I don't want to violate WP:3RR, but this element of this incident seems to have eluded me. - CobaltBlueTony

X - bracing

In the article, I read the following:

"One-story high black bands appear on the tower around the 30th–32nd, 64th–65th, 88th–89th, and 106th–107th floors. These allow ventilation for service equipment and obscure the tower's diagonal "X" bracing, which Sears Roebuck did not want to be visible."

I am quite familiar with the black bands; they are part of the structure's distinctive look. But the reason given here strikes me as nonsensical. How could widely spaced horizontal bands obscure large "X" bracing? Look at the Hancock. Try to imagine how horizontal bands could be used to cover that up. I suspect it was a silly comment inserted by someone who heard something from who knows where. I will not delete it now, but will do so without a cite in the near future. Unschool 16:19, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

Although I had never seen that fact cited anywhere else, it seems plausible. The diagonal bracing is not large like the Hancock's, it just occurs in 2-story bands around the mechanical floors which you can see if you look closely at the building at the right time. Montalto 18:37, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Okay, I can see that as possible. I'd still like a cite; I've spent lots of time in its shadow, been up it many times, but have never myself noticed this, let alone heard this explanation. Unschool 06:39, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Actually the bracing you are refering to is properly known as a belt truss. Belt truses improve stability from wind loads placed on many high-rise buildings. The belt trusses used in Sears Tower integrated well with the skyscraper's already tightly spaced grid of vertical members (columns) and horizontal members (spandrels). The most notable example of this structural element being used to augment the aesthetics of a skyscraper is Milwaukee’s First Wisconsin Center. --Rkrause 20:38, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Notes

The Sears Tower also has the most total floor space of any commercial building in the United States, and second-most overall to The Pentagon in Arlington County, Virginia. One-story high black bands appear on the tower around the 30th–32nd, 64th–65th, 88th–89th, and 106th–107th floors. These allow ventilation for service equipment and obscure the tower's diagonal "X" bracing,[citation needed] which Sears Roebuck did not want to be visible.

First, Sears is not the largest commercial building in the US. That goes to another building in the same city- The Merchandise Mart. Secondly, the bracing is visible so I doubt that visibility was the reason for the black panels. They could just be large spandrel panels or louvers. That information should be cited from a primary source. Please cite, edit or I will remove in two days.

I also can't believe that nothing was said about the building's innovative "bundled-tube" structural system. Gary Joseph 01:19, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Actually Sears Tower's gross floor area (which I gather had been calculated based on the BOMA standard) is well known to be 4.5 million square feet. I do not know how this compares to the Merchandise Mart, since all published material about that building does not distinguish between whether its 4.2 million square feet is really gross floor area or useable floor area. --Rkrause 20:11, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Also, louvres were installed at the mechanical floors to obscure the belt trusses that surround the building. The only exception is on the 88th and 89th floors where tinted windows are also present. I cannot recall where I read this; it was likely in one of my Sears Tower books. --Rkrause 20:18, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Actual number of stories

I would not necessary trust Emporis Buildings on this measurement. Some of their Sears Tower "facts" seem to be more questionable than based on truth. They explain that the number of stories is 110 only including the "elevator box". It should be noted that the two-story penthouse on Sears Tower is actually for housing the robotic window washers and it is also an integral part of the structure. (You will notice that they don't even mention this particular marvel of Sears Tower despite of its technological innovation). This brings the total number of above-ground physical floors to 110. --Rkrause 21:10, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

No, the standard method of counting floors in a building ignores the mechanical penthouse. Based on blueprint readings taken by Emporis editors, the tower only has 108 floors. Yes, the mechanical penthouse is an integral part of the structure and is included in the height, but you would have to change the floor count for the vast majority of buildings if you wanted to revise the rule. And this is not a forum for discussing what Emporis includes in its facts. Try e-mailing that website if you have something to contribute. Montalto 22:58, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

I am not aware of there existed a "rule" for counting floors in a building. (The very notion that a penthouse can be excluded only substantiates that this is an extra-ordinarily subjective method of measurement and I would not be surprised if it was the result of more fallacies purported again by the infamous CTBUH). If penthouses are to be excluded, then all mechanical floors should be excluded as a "rule" since they do not contribute to useable square footage. But regardless, since it seems that most "floor count" reverts to this page are being substantiated by the Emporis database, then this is the best place to discuss the matter. Wikipedia should cite information that is verifiable and reputable, and is of a neutral point of view. If a source is questionable then it should be brought up by editors for discussion, not dismissed as irrelavent so that only one point of view and one source can be trusted. Since Emporis makes its own claim that contradicts what the official Sears Tower Website (as well as hundreds of books, newspaper articles, journals, and magazines continue to claim to date), then that one controversial figure should not be the only information provided to readers. --Rkrause 03:45, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

The way I interpret Wikipedia's policy, the way to maintain neutrality is to use official sources ("no original research"), and the CTBUH is the closest you can come to an official source on building measurements. The Council is an organization of building professionals including engineers, architects, contractors, and building product vendors, so it represents a wide array of professional viewpoints. I don't know where your "infamous" qualification comes from; you are entitled to say it but Wikipedia aims to avoid this kind of POV. As for Emporis, its contributors are the only people compiling any serious statistics or doing significant research into building measurements, and two years ago the CTBUH adopted the Emporis database as its own official source of building data. I have said before that Emporis' data is not 100% accurate, and its editors will admit it; however they seem to try to use the best sources available on a subject that is notoriously difficult to research because they have to investigate building by building. However, they keep track of their sources so they can always tell you when they know something for sure and when they don't. With regard to the Sears Tower, you can find out from Emporis (if you communicate directly with them) the exact height of any floor in the building. The mechanical penthouse on top is 18 feet, 6.5 inches tall, and the blueprints show it starting at floor 109 with the very top roof being 110. Even if you wanted to count the penthouse, the building would only be 109 floors, which still contradicts the Sears Skydeck website and all those publications you referred to. As a member of the Skyscraperpage.com forum I can assert that I have never seen anyone insist on the inclusion of mechanical penthouses in the floor count, and if you talk to someone who lives in an 8-story building with a mechanical penthouse for a 9th floor, 99% of the time he will tell you it's an 8-story building. So I don't see the controversy. A lot of myths are propagated over the years in the media, and the idea that the Sears Tower had 110 floors is one of them unless someone can prove that the mechanical floors inside are divided differently from the way the blueprints suggest. I think it is better for Wikipedia to blow the myth (citing 1 or 2 outside sources) than to tow the old line simply because more sources do so.

You seem to have some good engineering knowledge yourself (based on your mention of belt trusses in yesterday's edits) and I appreciate your contribution in that regard. I didn't mean to try to silence you in my post above, I merely objected to your implication that Emporis was unreliable because it neglected to mention one interesting fact. Montalto 04:34, 6 October 2006 (UTC)