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PHILADELPHIA | Comcast Technology Center | 342m | 1121ft | 59 fl | Com

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#1 · (Edited by Moderator)




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Comcast to build second, taller Phila. skyscraper

Six years after Comcast Corp. moved into the tallest U.S. skyscraper between Manhattan and Chicago, the cable-TV and Internet giant expects to break ground this summer on an even taller, more dazzling $1.2-billion tower.

The new, 1,121-foot-tall building will be located on an adjacent block on Arch Street between 18th and 19th Streets in Center City, company officials said.

One of the world's leading architects, Britain's Norman Robert Foster, has designed the trophy building with a host of innovative features. Comcast is announcing the project Wednesday afternoon.

The building will at least initially be called the Comcast Innovation and Technology Center. Its structural "core" will run the vertical length of one side of the see-through all-glass tower, instead of through its middle, like a traditional skyscraper.

There will be 13 "sky gardens," or three-story atriums, for software designers, engineers and product developers to collaborate, and the building will be topped by a blade extending about 200 feet higher than the Comcast Center.

Comcast and Liberty Property Trust, its partner, have reached an agreement to relocate the Four Seasons Hotel at Logan Square to the new tower's top floors. One entrance will be designated for the 200-room hotel and a second entrance for Comcast employees. Separate banks of elevators will service both entrances.

At 59 stories, the tower will have about 1.5-million square feet of rentable space.

[...]
Read more at http://www.philly.com/philly/busine...er_Phila__skyscraper.html#A6DpKhuAd4YoET5U.99












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Previous proposal for the site: The American Commerce Center:


1,500 feet of Breaking News



Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls; friends, Romans, countrymen; members of the press: meet American Commerce Center.

Your Philly Skyline is about to change. About to incur a growth spurt. About to shatter any notion of Philadelphian reservedness, about to take A New Day A New Way to a whole other level.

The spired skyscraper pictured above and below would like to reclaim for the Central Business District one of its biggest surface parking lots, the one profiled in Monday's Penny Postcard post.

Led by its president Garrett Miller, Walnut Street Capital (WSC) has had a vision of major mixed-use for the lot at 1800 Arch Street since it acquired it in October. It brought on world renowed architecture firm Kohn Pedersen Fox (KPF) to craft that vision.

KPF is not only accustomed to Philadelphia, having recently designed the US Airways terminal at the airport and Huntsman Hall for the Wharton School of Business, but it is indeed well familiar with the very vicinity of 1800 Arch. As Center City watched its skyline be redefined in the 80s, KPF contributed Mellon Bank Center, which was originally to have been as tall as One Liberty Place, as well as Two Logan Square, One Logan Square and its adjacent Four Seasons Hotel. It's also worth mentioning that Gene Kohn, the Kohn of Kohn Pedersen Fox and chairman of the company, is from Philadelphia. He graduated from Penn in the 50s and cut his teeth working for Vincent Kling in the Penn Center 60s.

KPF also knows their way around the supertall. As we speak, their designs for new tallest buildings are under construction for skyscraper meccas Shanghai and Hong Kong, the Shanghai World Financial Center (1,588', 100 floors - Skyscraperpage) and International Commerce Center (1,608', 118 floors - Skyscraperpage), respectively.

Remember how Comcast Center -- one block away -- transformed the skyline? Well, brace yourself . . .



This is American Commerce Center.

The vitals: 26 story hotel, 473' to the garden accessible to hotel guests. 3-to-6 stories of street-accessible retail along Arch Street with a public garden facing the dome of the Arch Street Presbyterian Church, and another garden on the sixth floor, between Arch and Cuthbert and overlooking the one below. 63 story office tower, 1,210' to the lower portion of the roof, 1,500' to the top of the spire. All parking is underground, including dedicated bicycle parking. LEED gold.

Mayor Michael Nutter, via his Press Secretary Doug Oliver, believes that "it would be a spectacular addition to Philadelphia's skyline. Sustainability efforts and building green continue to be hallmarks of this Administration and the plans for this particular project are consistent with those goals."

If we've learned anything over the past five years of Philly's mini building boom, it's that the streetscape trumps all else when surveying a new building's contribution to the city.



Garrett Miller knew this going into concept: "it has to be engaging at the street level, or else it is a failure." The pedestrian fabric is as much a part of American Commerce Center (ACC) as is its height. Along 18th Street, following the natural direction of (vehicular) traffic, the pedestrian is greeted with a mini-plaza that will be home to a café and the three-story lobby of the hotel. At 19th & Arch, the main entrance of the office tower amplifies the corner by the tower's massing being sliced -- chamfered -- back from the street corner.

Make no mistake, though, the height is very much a part of ACC. That same chamfer is echoed as the tower rises, and at its top, it then angles again back to a large spire. Miller clarifies, "while the vision of the building is to engage the pedestrian -- to engage Philadelphia -- at the street level, we also want the tower to be a symbol of our collective aspiration and hope. We want it to be seen from far away, literally and figuratively."

Even in a questionable market, funding does not appear to present a problem, as Miller cites that partners have been established and that the lot was purchased with 100% equity. Put another way: construction could start whenever.

Where it becomes a little tricky is with the 125' blanket height limit which Fifth District Councilman Darrell Clarke enacted following the then-Barnes Tower controversy. The site is currently zoned C4, which does not have a height restriction, but with a large FAR (floor area ratio), ACC would need rezoning. Councilman Clarke declined comment on American Commerce Center for the time being.

Rob Stuart, president of the Logan Square Neighborhood Association, feels that "the height is less important than how it meets the street," and in that regard, the developer has done his homework. "This is a very serious design, with a well qualified firm," Stuart continues, referring to KPF's track record.



For a site that has been a surface parking lot for nearly thirty years, a lot of thought and consideration has been paid to its redevelopment. So much so that it may prove a lot for some neighbors to handle. For this reason, Miller expects WSC to meet with neighbors to hear their concerns and to build a comfort level. Stuart appreciates the thought that has gone into ACC, but says "now we have to evaluate the impact such a large project will have on the neighborhood."

In fact, Mayor Nutter encourages it: "through a series of community forums, various stakeholder groups will have an opportunity to voice the concerns that they may have. We don't have a full picture of what that feedback will be, but concerns will be heard and appropriately handled."

It will be interesting to see how ACC is exemplified as LSNA and the City Planning Commission continue to develop their neighborhood master plan, which they're already in the middle of. While Logan Square contains elements of an 'urban village', it is also very much the Central Business District, which the Planning Commission sees as Arch Street to Market Street. Our skyline's current shape is no accident.

Because the LSNA-PCPC plan-in-progress is so complex, LSNA has a set of design principles to apply in the interim. Stuart says that WSC "has taken account of a number of our principles, notably the street level and sustainability."

The recently announced plans for the 12th & Market Girard Estate present an interesting juxtaposition when compared against ACC's plans, which are of equal endeavor. The Girard site will require not only massive amounts of demolition -- on top of the subway portion of the Market-Frankford El, no less -- but also the demolition of one of Philadelphia's oldest standing skyscrapers, the 1896 Stephen Girard Building by James H Windrim. At 1800 Arch, ACC has only a parking lot attendant's booth in its way.


kpf.com

For further reading:

http://www.acctower.com
http://www.kpf.com
http://www.walnutstcapital.com

Source - www.phillyskyline.com/
 
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#101 ·
I wonder if the commieblock behind this lot with be demolished? It's entirely out of place in such great location.
 
#104 ·
Well you gotta remember that this is only the planning stage. My guess is that just the way the FT went through different design stages, most likely the ACC will undergo the same process. Experts in Philadelphia have said themselves that it will probably be redesigned so that it fits the city.
 
#111 ·
1,500-foot tower plan in Philadelphia heralds new era of super-tall skyscrapers

Sat, Mar. 22, 2008

1,500-foot tower plan in Philadelphia heralds new era of super-tall skyscrapers

By Inga Saffron
Inquirer Architecture Critic


The most notable fact about a new proposal to build a record-breaking 1,500-foot skyscraper at 18th and Arch Streets isn't the building's stunning height. It's that its height isn't an issue for Philadelphians.
Two decades after this city underwent a wrenching public soul-searching over the prospect that the 945-foot-tall Liberty Place would overshadow the City Hall tower, the first question many are asking about the proposed American Commerce Center is: "What are the odds of its getting built?"

Slim but better than zero, city real estate handicappers say. Yet even if this statuesque tower never takes its place alongside the skyline's current pinnacle, the 975-foot Comcast Tower, it's a good bet Center City will see skyscrapers of the same immense scale piercing the clouds in the not-distant future.

One Liberty Place held the title of Philadelphia's tallest building for 20 years, until it was overtaken last year. Its successor is unlikely to wear the mantle for long, predicted John Gattuso, the Liberty Property Trust executive who built Comcast's glass obelisk.

"There's a high probability we'll see super-tall towers in the next round of building," he said. "When will we get to the height of the one that's proposed? Who knows? But it's wonderful that Philadelphians are thinking in those terms."

In general, it seems that tall buildings are getting taller. During the recent condo boom, 400-foot towers became commonplace in many cities, including Philadelphia. Now, super-tall towers, as their champions call them, are going through the stratosphere.

New York is building the 1,776-foot Freedom Tower at Ground Zero to replace the lost World Trade Center (1,368 feet). It soon will be bested by Santiago Calatrava's swirling 2,000-foot Chicago Spire. Both buildings, however, will have to look up to Burj Dubai, which will soar a half-mile above the earth at 2,300 feet after its completion in the United Arab Emirates next year.

Heavyweights of the super-tall club are mainly rising in go-go financial centers such as Dubai, Shanghai and Hong Kong, eager to present a visible statement of their ambitions. But the architect A. Eugene Kohn, who has designed two of the world's highest buildings and is overseeing the American Commerce Center plans, contends that any city that expects to remain competitive in the energy-conscious 21st century will have to embrace super-tall buildings.

"When these towers are well planned and served by transit, they're incredibly energy-efficient," said Carol Willis, director of New York's Skyscraper Museum. They make cities more livable by providing the critical mass to justify amenities, she believes.

Walnut Street Capital, the investment group behind the American Commerce Center, clearly thought the lot at 18th Street met the criteria for a super-tall building when it paid $30 million for the half-block property last year. Though the site does not connect to the Suburban Station Concourse, architects are looking at ways to extend that underground passage, which now terminates under the Comcast building. The site is accessible to SEPTA, Amtrak and the airport.

Like most super-tall towers, American Commerce would offer more than one use. The complex would include a hollowed trapezoid on the 18th Street side that would rise 477 feet and include a 33-story hotel, three levels of shops, movie theaters, and a conference center, as well as landscaped plazas served by cafes and restaurants. Another retail level is designated for a big-box store such as Crate & Barrel, and there is room in the underground level for a supermarket.

Yet despite the center's boast of soaring 1,500 feet, its office tower would top out at just 1,200 feet. A 300-foot spire would poke out from its asymmetrically sliced crown - like a toothpick in a martini glass. That crown, incidentally, is a virtual clone of the original design that Daniel Libeskind submitted for Freedom Tower in 2003.

The complex probably would be faced in glass, but the architects are a long way from completing the details. While northwest corners would be angled, the Center City side appears dully squared off.

One odd thing about the 1,200-foot tower, which would be on the 19th Street side of the site, is that it would contain just 62 office floors above the eight-story base of amenities. That would give American Commerce about 1.3 million square feet of office space, roughly the same as the Comcast building, which has 57 floors and a similar footprint. American Commerce's total would be 2.2 million square feet.

Most of today's super-tall towers, Willis noted, are residential buildings. They need fewer elevators than offices do, and they don't have to waste precious floor space on bulky service cores.

For many Philadelphians, it's hard to imagine a big project of either type getting off the ground with a recession looming. Yet this market doesn't follow a typical pattern.

Other than the Comcast building and the petite Cira Centre, there has been virtually no office construction here since the 1991 real estate crash. The city's office buildings are as technologically out of date as a five-year-old laptop and have trouble satisfying companies that want fast Internet and high energy efficiency.

So, although the real estate market has stalled, American Commerce's investors believe there is a pent-up demand here for new high-tech offices. The strategy, said attorney Peter Kelsen, is to take advantage of low office rents to lure out-of-town companies that are eager to cut costs. Philadelphia's rents are half of New York's.

If American Commerce can find a starter tenant to take 30 percent of its floor space, the project could get a green light. Because it is backed by a pension fund, Walnut Street Capital won't need to scramble for bank financing.

But it will be competing with Liberty Property Trust and Brandywine Realty, which also plan new office buildings. Unlike Walnut Capital, those companies have proved they can build a tower.

Source - http://www.philly.com/philly/news/h...eralds_new_era_of_super-tall_skyscrapers.html
 
#112 ·
Again I say this will be a fantastic building but the previous article has this taller than the former twins. In reality the 1368 ft twins are being compared to the 1368 ft Freedom Tower and the 1200 something foot building in Philly. The spires make it seem that FT is over 400 ft taller than the former twins and this building taller than the Sears Tower. Not long ago the famous building war between Sears/Petronas had all Sears lovers crying fowl. I took the side of Sears. That was a debacle.

No doubts this is a beautiful building and a treat for Philadelphia BUT I wouldn't compare it as 525 ft taller than Comcast.
 
#124 ·
With the wage taxes that I would guess are still there, the politics of the City, the mass transit shortcomings of the area, and especially with Eagle fans, why would any business relocate to Philadelphia?


I lived 30 of my 43 years in that area. When anyone outside ripped on Philly we had a slogan......Don't pick on Philly, it's a sh%thole, but i's OUR sh&thole. It is what it is. Unfortunately it isn't satisfied to be what it is, it wants to be NYC.


Philadelphia won't draw much from outside with the tax issues you face just for the privaledge of working there and many other problems it has. If they want to build and lease soemthing like this they really need to focus on business that is already there. Banking and pharmaceuticals. trouble with the pharms is that they are very comfy out in the western 'burbs. Again, with the taxes and transportation, why go downtown?
 
#126 ·
Well if there's one thing I do know, it's NOT trying to be NYC. Just because they're close together and have histories that sometimes are similar doesn't mean a thing. They're so very different. Truth is, Philly has A LOT to offer. Just taking a long walk in and around Center City, hanging out in Old City, Manayunk, South Street, and the old Italian Market you really get a sense that Philly is one of a kind. But it's not the right timing to push a 1500-foot tower, especially one that has little architectural value.
 
#127 ·
I meant from a business and theatre standpoint. We'll agree to disagree on the City and its merits. Great historical City, that's for certain. What you mentioned were positives to the place, but the weather and transportation nightmare that it has become more than outweighed long walks in center city. But we digress, this website is about the building, not the City itself.

I think we agree though, that this building, as it is drawn, doesn't work. And right now with banks the way they are with lending, I can't see a developer actually getting financing to build it.
 
#128 ·
Pennstar, agree with your take on Philly attracting pharma, law and banking firms. I would even add insurance firms to that list. A 1500 foot tower will have architectural value no matter how it looks, besides, whats most important for a builder is getting returns out of it.

Coming back to Disneyland Philadelphia, lets just kill this thought right here. Knowing Philly, there is no way in hell a Disneyland will come here. Besides, Philadelphia already has Six Flags and Hershey Park.

No doubt Philly is a great cultural city, but from the business point of view, I would say that its still less important than Boston or DC. Of course, NYC is NYC. Philly's great unionism and dirty politics are also a big turnoff. Oh, and Septa!
 
#132 ·
When starts the construction ?


PS: congratulations from Germany...........the country without great skyscrapers :gaah: (exception frankfurt am Main) to the old and new skyscraper-nation...
 
#134 ·
It's quite possible, though; there are taller skyscrapers going up all over the US, more than any other period in time, and in places you'd never expect with supertalls in places you'd never expect to see them. To deny this is the act of an idiot.

If they try hard enough, they can get this project going; it all depends on backing. I love how people say crap like, "It will never be built" in every other thread. A 600m+ building is one thing, but all it takes is money these days.
 
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