Cities reassess skyscraper plans

By IAN BURRELL and CATHERINE MASTERS

The fiery collapse of the twin towers of the World Trade Center has cast a pall over the future of the skyscraper as the ultimate symbol of corporate power.

High buildings have been irresistible to developers, with the triple lure of powerful architecture, visual statement and copious floor space. But now the era of the skyscraper in London, New York and elsewhere is being reassessed.

In London, commentators had hailed 2001 "The Year of the Skyscraper". Mayor Ken Livingstone had backed plans for clusters of Manhattan-style office blocks.

But building experts called for a fundamental rethink of the safety implications after the vulnerability of tall buildings was so vividly exposed.

Aaron Morby, editor of Construction News, said: "These buildings cannot be evacuated quickly. That starts to raise very significant issues."

Mr Morby said it was impossible to protect any building against "a Boeing flying at cruising speed", but skyscrapers attracted terrorists' attention.

"By their very nature, they are iconic and it means that they are going to be targets from now on."

The New York Times sparked debate under the heading "Reaching the Sky, Finding a Limit".

It said: "In their audacious pursuit of astonishing height to glorify a god, immortalise a builder, mark a spot or lure a tenant, architects have created pyramids, domes, minarets, campaniles, spires and skyscrapers. But at the World Trade Center, they inadvertently created something else. Targets."

Cesar Pelli, the architect of the two tallest buildings in the world, the twin Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur, told the Times: "The desire to reach for the sky runs very deep in our human psyche. But I imagine there will be a slowdown in the pursuit of very tall buildings for a while.

"Since the Tower of Babel, there is this desire to put a marker up in the sky."

David Childs, of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, architects of the third- and fourth-tallest buildings, the Sears Tower in Chicago and the Jin Mao Building in Shanghai, said: "I don't think tenants are immediately going to want to be at the top of a tall building, especially one that's an icon."

Skyscrapers, a symbol of New York and America, have also come to dominate the skylines of many Asian cities.

Critics say that moderate-sized skyscrapers use resources, building materials and space efficiently, but the taller the building the more they cause strains on materials, lifts and power supplies.

This week, New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani said the "skyline will be made whole again".

In London, structural engineer John MacArthur said it was important not to see tall buildings as the sole targets of terrorists. "The Pentagon was attacked and that was only a six-storey building. I don't think it makes a huge amount of difference whether the building is low or high."

Mr MacArthur said that any "prestige building" with "large concentrations of people" was prone to terrorist attack.

As urban Auckland sprawls, moderately tall buildings have become popular for offices and apartments. But a good example, the ANZ Centre (formerly the Coopers & Lybrand building) in Albert St, has just 39 floors and pales in comparison to the twin towers which would have squinted down at our tallest structure, the Sky Tower.

Graham Rowe, marketing manager for the Building Research Association of New Zealand, said the future of skyscrapers here was a non-issue. "We don't have buildings that high anyway. If you want to fly a light aircraft into things, I suppose you can, but if people are going to crash aircraft, I guess the challenge is to prevent them from being able to do so."

Tall buildings here would be affected only if the numerous forthcoming inquiries into the structure of the twin towers found shortfalls which needed to be addressed.

The Ascot Metropolis hotel and apartments in Auckland has 35 floors. The man behind the building, Andrew Krukziener, is out of the country, but property manager Andrea McArthur did not expect New Zealanders to feel any differently.

"There's not the perceived terrorism threat here as opposed to in the States."

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