June 11, 2023
"It’s the leaning tower of San Francisco. The Bay Area’s Millennium Tower has only continued to tilt further..."
"... and sink deeper west in spite of architects’ best efforts to steady the ritzy building. The multimillion-dollar-per-unit tower is now leaning more than 29 inches at the corner of Fremont and Mission streets — a slant over half an inch deeper than previously revealed.... The half-inch tilt was reportedly gained while engineers dug beneath the sinking condominium earlier this year to support the weight of the tower — which was built atop a former landfill — along its two sides...."
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35 comments:
The perfect metaphor.
I have a civil engineering degree but didn’t practice. This monstrosity needs to be taken down. The maintenance costs far outweigh its usefulness. At some point admit mistakes were made.
IMHO trying to prop it up is a mistake. Next big earthquake and it’s gone. Just tear it down and start over, now that you know more about the ground underneath
So we built a skyscraper on top of a landfill in one of the nation's most earthquake-prone seismic zones. What could go wrong?
San Francisco urban planning at its best...
Between the dwindling need for office space in SF, the eyesore that this building is, and the safety concerns (plus Gator's point about maintenance costs); tear it down. If a half inch is a concern, then liquefaction during the next major SF earthquake will bring it down.
The Big One.
Then what? Not if, but when.
No, it's cool. It's a self-driving building.
Lawyers have lined up all the plaintiffs imaginable.
Next medium size earthquake takes this thing down.
San Fran has always been the poor man's Venice. Rot, mold, moisture and decay. At least La Serenissima knows how to sink buildings with style and longevity.
They're already at a 40% office vacancy rate there in downtown SF. Not sure who is going to be the next to sign a long-term lease for a space in that building, which...as it sinks into the west, becomes a representation of the entire San Francisco slide into history.
Maybe they should rename it Tower Seven.
San Francisco has a history of building on landfill. In the last big earthquake, lots of houses sunk a full story into the muck.
Sometimes you do not even get that far. Leaning Tower of Padre:
https://www.walterpmoore.com/projects/ocean-tower-failure-analysis
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AKNl9RFwvC4
In my former (working) life I was a liscenced PE in Civil Engineering.
Here's a pro tip: Get the foundation right FIRST.
The article says the additions to the foundtion were driven to bedrock. It does NOT say the original foundation went to bedrock, but was built over a former landfill.
No red flags there, no siree. (Although media reports on engineering - and a host of other technical issues - are otoriously foolish.)
God help the "owners" of the existing units. If there are vacncies left in this multimillion per unit fiasco, does ANYONE think ANYBODY will buy them no matter the assurances?
It's leaning 29" where? I'm assuming they mean at the top, but it would be nice if the article stated that.
How do the residents, especially those on the upper floors, cope? Do they have special tables, sinks, etc? Did they repour the floors?
Giant malpractice case.
"The half-inch tilt was reportedly gained while engineers dug beneath the sinking condominium earlier this year to support the weight of the tower — which was built atop a former landfill..."
And was the landfill, in turn, built atop an ancient Italian burial ground?
which was built atop a former landfill
Garbage in, garbage out.
Pro tip when building a skyscraper on a landfill: Dig down to bedrock, then pour the foundation. Not pour the foundation, then dig down to bedrock.
built on a landfill near earthquake zones. Sign me up!
and now - with double the urine and feces on the street in front of the building - and no place to shop because the looting and shoplifting closed it all down.
I can't imagine my multi-million-dollar investment turning to shit overnight!!!!
I'll bet most of these folks are Chinese. They thought they could invest in the States, and preserve their capital. I would have thought that was a good bet too!!
Wait until the Ring-of-Fire strikes!!
My in-laws in Portland are having trouble downsizing from their condo. We already know......They are going to realize negative gain in their condo investment. It's a too-die-for condo. The Willamette, Portland city, and Mt. Hood views out of every window.
I think part of it is Portland, and their progressive policies. Did I mention Portland always elects Democrats??
As wife's friend from high school explained....."White Wine Matters!!"
The county where the wife and I first lived tried to repurpose an old, closed, landfill into an industrial park for light industry. They found out the hard way that landfills outgas methane for a long, long, time after it’s been closed. Also that methane and welding shops don’t mix.
"Although media reports on engineering - and a host of other technical issues - are otoriously foolish."
Media reports on just about everything are notoriously foolish. It would be simpler to list the few things they report accurately.
@Temujin: The Transamerica Building has just finished a 500 million dollar refurbishment (begun before 2020) with upgrades top to bottom, including open spaces exclusively for tenants. They're boasting that the rents will be the highest in the City and that it will become once again the most prestigious address for big name businesses. I saw some of the pics. Nice, but I think they're spitting into the wind. That strategy won't work when 3 out of 4 storefronts on the surrounding streets are vacant and boarded up. I work a couple of blocks away. The district is a shadow of its former self.
2008: American Concrete Institute Awards, Northern California – Construction
2008: Concrete Industry Board – Roger H. CIB Award of Merit
2009: American Society of Civil Engineers, Region 9 – Structural Engineering Project of the Year
2008: American Society of Civil Engineers, San Francisco Section – Outstanding Structural Engineering Project
2009: Metal Architecture Magazine – April 2009 edition Top Honor
2009: California Construction – Outstanding Project Management
2009: California Construction – Multi-family/Residential, Award of Merit
2010: San Francisco Business Times – Deal of the Year Award
2010: San Francisco Chamber of Commerce Excellence in Business Awards – Building San Francisco Award
"The multimillion-dollar-per-unit tower is now leaning more than 29 inches ... "
Others have correctly noted that this is a meaningless statistic.
An architect writes about San Francisco's also-leaning Millenium Tower ...
The building has settled downwards, and is, in fact, tilting. Most reports say the building has settled about 17 inches, and is leaning 14 inches westward and 6 inches northward at its crown. Settlement is normal, (more about that later), but what about the tilt? Let’s do a little math: at the top, the horizontal displacement is 15.2 inches (hypotenuse of a 14:6 triangle), and the building is 645 feet tall, so the Millennium Tower is leaning 0.11 degrees to the west-northwest. How significant is this? At its most precarious, Pisa’s famous tower leaned about 5.5 degrees, but it has been stabilized in recent times to lean “only” 4.0 degrees. Right now, its apex is displaced about 13 feet. The Leaning Tower of Pisa is only 183 feet tall; if the Millennium Tower leaned 4.0 degrees, its top would be displaced 45 feet! London’s 315 foot Big Ben is also leaning, but merely 0.26 degrees, a little over twice the tilt of the Millennium Tower.
That’s enough math, but it does show that San Francisco’s tower is almost not leaning at all ...
San Francisco’s Tilting Tower
[catastrophic] [anthropogenic] climate cooling... warming... change, obviously. Islands, too.
". . . and sink deeper west in spite of architects’ best efforts to steady the ritzy building"
Heh, heh, heh,
As the first commenter said - a perfect metaphor for San Francisco, a modern edifice built on an unstable landfill, now uncontrollably tilting with unintended consequences, causing panic and confusion among the directly affected.
And to carry it further, the reporting on the story does nothing to bring nuance or context to the story, or a sense of proportional impact, by providing insights into the risk, or some kind of hint at the future resolution. Just: more panic and confusion.
Oh, and the engineers say it'll be fixed by next month.
How fitting.
"so the Millennium Tower is leaning 0.11 degrees to the west-northwest."
Ah! Do the residents even notice?
Mason G,
"It would be simpler to list the few things they report accurately."
Happy to oblige. Here's the list:
Something in SF leans left. this is news?
There was an episode of the Andy Griffith show that dealt with similar structural issues. As described by IMDB:
A $500 bequest to the church creates a bit of a predicament for Andy. The Reverend asks Andy to chair a three member panel, with himself and Martha Clark as members, to decide how to best spend the money. They get three proposals. Elmo suggests that they buy a pool table for the men's club. Aunt Bee and Clara Edwards suggest that, after many years of asking, the choir be provided with robes. Lastly, Howard and Emmett suggest that the money be used to level the church building which, over the years, has developed a bit of a tilt. When it comes to a vote, the Reverend opts for fixing the building and Martha votes for the robes. No one is interested in the pool table idea so it's left to Andy to cast the deciding ballot. His decision causes division in the community and it's Howard that comes up with a solution that pleases everyone.
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