Don't know if anyone caught it last week, but, the Discovery Channel ran a 4-part series of Modern Marvels called "Building A Skyscraper." Now, while the series was about the construction of the new CalTrans HQ in Los Angeles, there was a fair amount of the history of skyscrapers, and naturally, a good deal of talk about Chicago.

At any rate, during the program, there were some rather flattering fly-overs from very rare angles of our beautiful city and, while completely hokie, I couldn't resist the urge to take some pictures of them. So, naturally, my apologies for the shitty quality, but, what do you expect when you take a picture of a television? :)

Enjoy.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v240/geoff_diamond/Chicago%20-%20Photographs/discovery_09200401.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v240/geoff_diamond/Chicago%20-%20Photographs/discovery_09200402.jpg

Yeah, I was going to mention last week (or the week before, forget when it first aired) the amazing fly-overs.

Although I found it very difficult ot consider the new Caltrain building (however cool it looks) as a skyscraper. Guess I'm spoiled.

Yeah, lol, no shit. It's like 13 stories... and they kept referring to it like it was some earth-shattering project. Pretty lame... but, a great series nonetheless.

Modern Marvels is on the History Channel, not Discovery.

rofl... woops :) I was thinking of Extreme Engineering for some reason when I typed this up. sorry!

They had some great shots of buildings in Chicago. Including the one I live in. (OK, so it was in the background of the building they were discussing.) I agree that the CalTrans building, as cool as it is (and I think it is way cool), isn't much of a "skyscraper", more like a midrise.

I saw a better documentary a couple week back anyway. It was on the Travel Channel, and was about building the Sears Tower. Interesting story about the construction was during summer the ironworkers would still be wearing heavy coats and gloves because it was so cold at the top. Almost freezing on some days. When they got back down they would get wierd looks from people because, at ground level, temps would be around 100.

ahahahaha... that's awesome!

Boo, I missed it, I hope they replay it.

I caught parts of an interesting documentary today on the Travel channel where they talked about the battle of the pizza, NY's thin slices vs. Chicago's deep dish, they went into details about the history and all that, it was pretty cool.

Not to bump, but this thread seems more appropriate than a new one.

Modern Marvels will be airing a show on the Sears Tower this Wednesday at 10/9c. The next airing at a reasonable time after Wednesday will be Saturday at 4/3c.

A short description of the episode can be found here (http://www.historychannel.com/global/listings/episode_detail_date.jsp?hp=THC&netwCode=THC&asof=10%2F13%2F2004+10%3A00PM).

You rawk STR. Thanks for the head's up!!! *adds it to Tivo*

You rawk STR.

Yes. Yes I do.