1 World Trade Center Becomes the Tallest Building In NYC 407
darthcamaro writes "On 9/11, terrorists took the lives of thousands of Americans — and removed a pair of icons from the New York City skyline. For the last 10+ years, The Empire State Building was the tallest building in NYC, but that changed today. 'Poking into the sky, the first column of the 100th floor of 1 World Trade Center will bring the tower to a height of 1,271 feet, making it 21 feet higher than the Empire State Building.'"
Re:Construct, not building (Score:5, Interesting)
Clearly Slashdot is news for the kind of nerd who nerds out about what kind of news is for nerds.
I come to Slashdot because every once in a while I find one insightful, useful comment that changes my whole understanding of a technical issue. Because the timing and location of those comments are unpredictable and they occur seemingly at random the great "comment hunt" triggers all of the same mental processes as a gambling addiction. So, Slashdot is essentially an Internet slot machine, and they payout is in obscure knowledge. Also, I'm used to the green color, that doesn't hurt.
Re:What's up with the trolls? (Score:4, Interesting)
"our government" Huh? AFAICT, "our government" didn't own the world trade center. If you happen to live in NY/NJ and you think of the Port Authority as "your government" I guess you could fault it for not rebuilding. But I'm still unclear why the hell a Port Authority would be in real estate to begin with...
Re:What's up with the trolls? (Score:5, Interesting)
"Ladies and gentlemen, I'm afraid there's been a serious misunderstanding.
"The United States of America is the most powerful nation that has ever existed on this planet. Our citizens spend more on the opening weekend of a movie than the GDP of 40% of the planet. We provide aid in the billions to countries all over the world. We have been to the moon. We can destroy any part of this earth as easily as drinking a cup of coffee.
*sips coffee*
"This was the master stroke by a group of madmen who wish to murder civilians in the name of god. We will not be going to war to punish those who have the misfortune of being near these madmen. We know who they are, we know where they are, and will will bring them to justice here in the USA to face murder charges. If they are found guilty in a court of law, they face the death penalty in New York county.
"In the meantime, we will show you what is meant by 'the most powerful nation on earth'. By the end of this year, we will rebuild those towers and your master stroke will be gone. Yes, those who were murdered are gone from this earth, and we grieve for their loss. But we are America, and we have faced tougher challenges before. You cannot attack us because we will always return, we will never forget, and we will never surrender.
Good night, everyone."
-- What he should have said, 11 September 2011
Re:News for nerds? (Score:5, Interesting)
Depends on how you measure buildings: do you count architectural spires or antenna, or just measure to the top of occupied floors? As noted in TFA, there's a lot of arguments about these factors when comparing building heights. Personally, as an engineer, I'm more interested in the height as measured by occupied floors, because the rest is just fluff. Anyone can add a mast (either non-functional, as in the case of spires, or functional, in the case of antennas) to the top of some building. In fact, some structures don't even qualify as buildings, as they're just giant antenna (such as the one in North Dakota that's the tallest structure in North America), but to me a giant antenna is nowhere near as significant an engineering accomplishment as a giant building, so the antennas slapped on top should be ignored when comparing heights.
Re:Shameful that it took so long (Score:4, Interesting)
Did you see the interview with the architect?
He looked like his kids had been killed, and I suppose they were. He was talking about how it was actually designed to withstand the impact of a 707, which was the biggest plane at the time. Building it to withstand a 747 would have been the equivalent of designing to withstand the impact of the Space Shuttle.