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by Tondoteottotote on April 26th, 2006

Tondoteottotote

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Why are there laws in various cities limiting the height of new skyscrapers?

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  • by KevinW42 on January 22nd, 2007

    KevinW42

    In Washington D.C., buildings cannot be built taller than 550 feet because the tallest building is supposed to be the Washington Monument.

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  • by PerpetualAFK on March 3rd, 2007

    PerpetualAFK

    In Manhattan, New York, there is what is known as "air space". That is, there are all kinds of regulations about how high the buildings can go. The reason for this is that city planners don't want massive buildings blocking out all the sunlight. Air space can also be transferred. For example, Rockefeller owed a large portion of land in Manhattan's downtown. On most of that land, he built buildings that were lower than what the permits allowed for. The air space he saved on each building was then transferred to the massive Rockefeller center, which dwarfs the buildings around it.

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  • by Alatea on May 1st, 2006

    Alatea

    It appears to be a safety concern which in turn creates a cost concern too.
    ------------------------
    Despite many of the sophisticated innovations which have given designers greater freedom in design, such as liquid filled columns and flame shielding, fire and safety still remain major concerns. Today's high-rise reflects the quality of technology which has developed around it, but exhibits different problems from the early tall buildings. For example, its materials and contents may be less combustible and susceptible to destruction, but as most buildings are now sealed, there are greater problems of escape, adequate breathable air and the increased spread of flame vertically. Despite the improvements which have taken place in building technology, 12,200 lives are still lost each year in the United States due to fire, and nearly $3 billion worth of property destroyed.

    "People collect stamps, furniture, all manner of things, but not building regulations. They are regarded, apparently, as working tools to be repaired when necessary or discarded for a new model when their useful life is over. They are regarded as historical evidence only officially, and then not at all times...thus there is very little interest in what 'was' simply as an historical fact. Objective studies of building regulations are almost non- existent, so that the question 'What is building regulation?' which must arise first in any such study, is very rarely asked." McFee Rogers. The Law of Canadian Municipal Corporations. Toronto, Carswell, 1959.

    This is a good read - Copyright 1996 by Robert C. Greenstreet
    http://architronic.saed.kent.edu/v5n2/v5n2.03.html

    FIRES AND SKYSCRAPERS
    The danger of an uncontrollable fire breaking out within a skyscraper is ever-present and real -- despite the advances in fire-proofing through materials and methods, there is still no fire-proof building (whatever Bradbury claimed in Fahrenheit 451...). Due to the enormous amount of people living and working in a high-rise and the difficulty of rescuing them, especially from the highest floors, a fire in a skyscraper is always a horrible occurrence.

    Despite the risks, far from all has been done to improve the fire-resistance of high-rises. In Chicago, for example, 1,110 out of 1,400 buildings over 27 m tall (at least eight floors) are without automatic fire sprinkler systems. The National Fire Protection Association has stated that sprinkler systems can deal with 98% of occurring fires. Moreover, retrofitting a sprinkler system to an old building is a relatively inexpensive procedure -- and one that pays itself back not only as a means of saving lives, but also in the form of lower insurance costs and lowered requirements for structural and surface materials as well as a "moral protection" in the case of a lawsuit...

    Buildings of eight storeys or more especially require effective means to counter possible fire hazard because normal fire ladders can't reach higher than that eight storeys, or 27 m. If the ladder isn't enough and the service elevators (that are usually the ones used by firefighters) don't function or are unreachable, firemen have to carry their heavy equipment with them all the way up the stairs filled with smoke and toxic gases. In the USA, every year an average of 125 firemen die in these firefighting situations.

    This provides a lot of info
    http://www.greatgridlock.net/NYC/nycadd.html#zone

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  • by timmyjo on March 19th, 2007

    timmyjo

    Because of 911 or because they plan on having roads up there in the future

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