Empire State of Mind
Will the US get back into the record tall buildings game?
May 22, 2017
1. The United States, the modern world’s pioneer in tall buildings, is no longer home to the tallest skyscraper.
2. Completed in 2014, One World Trade Center is the tallest building in the United States — and the fourth-tallest in the world.
3. It is the main building in a complex of structures built on the site of the World Trade Center towers destroyed on September 11, 2001.
4. It tops out at a symbolic 1,776 feet (541 meters), in honor of the year the U.S. Declaration of Independence was signed.
5. As of January 2016, One World Trade Center is the only U.S. building among the top ten.
6. Of the world’s 100 tallest buildings, the United States only has 17.
7. Chicago’s Willis Tower (formerly known as the Sears Tower) now ranks as the world’s 11th-tallest building.
8. At 1,451 feet (442 meters) tall, it was the world’s tallest completed skyscraper from 1974 until 1998, when it was surpassed by the Petronas Towers in 1998.
9. The first supertall building – one exceeding the Eiffel Tower’s 300-meter height – was New York’s iconic Chrysler Building, completed in 1930.
10. It was followed the next year by the Empire State Building.
Source: The Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat.