SAN FRANCISCO | Transbay Tower | 326m | 1070ft | 60 fl | Prep

[612bv3]

Current design of Transbay Tower by Cesar Pelli (October 2012):

Originally Posted by SF1977

Some more info and new renderings of the tweaked design:


www.socketsite.com

www.socketsite.com

www.socketsite.com

More info.

Older designs:
See posts 74 and 88 for older models/renderings.

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The winning design by Cesar Pelli:



Proposal to build two massive towers in SF
- John King, Chronicle Urban Design Writer
Thursday, December 21, 2006

(12-21) 15:01 PST SAN FRANCISCO -- Developers have filed a proposal to erect the nation's tallest buildings outside of New York and Chicago - a pair of slender San Francisco towers that would climb 350 feet higher than the Transamerica Pyramid.

The plan, filed today with the city's planning department, envisions a cluster of unusually thin high-rises spread across two acres at the northwest corner of First and Mission streets: two 1, 200-foot towers, two 900-foot structures and a 600-foot companion.

Down on the ground would be an open plaza, covered passageways and two small existing buildings.

By comparison, the Transamerica Pyramid is 853 feet high and the Bank of America building is 779 feet. The only buildings in the United States of greater height than what is proposed for San Francisco are Sears Tower in Chicago and New York's Empire State Building.

Today's filing is an application to start the environmental review process, rather than a formal design unveiling. By the time that occurs, the heights and dimensions of the towers could change.

The lead architect for the project is Renzo Piano, who also is doing the new home of the California Academy of Sciences in Golden Gate Park.

"It is highly conceptual at this point," Mark Solit, a member of the development team, said of the project. "Conceptual in terms of our discussion with the city, and conceptual in terms of Renzo Piano Building Workshop's vision of what they think might be appropriate."

E-mail John King at jking@sfchronicle.com.


URL: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cg...AGUNN44C07.DTL

[colemonkee]

Wow. So this is in addition to the planned Transbay towers, I presume? If that's the case, SF may be getting 3 towers over 1,000 ft.

[Armon]

Originally Posted by colemonkee

Wow. So this is in addition to the planned Transbay towers, I presume? If that's the case, SF may be getting 3 towers over 1,000 ft.

No this is the proposal for the transbay towers.

[wynngd]

It's been quite a while since there a new high rise building being developed in SFO.I've been there and all the tourists are attracted with Golden gate bridge than the SF city. This will be a great project!

[OhioTodd]

Originally Posted by Armon

No this is the proposal for the transbay towers.

Apparently this is in addition to the Transbay towers..at least from the talk on SSP.
http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/showthread.php?t=122300

[Armon]

Originally Posted by wynngd

It's been quite a while since there a new high rise building being developed in SFO.I've been there and all the tourists are attracted with Golden gate bridge than the SF city. This will be a great project!

actually there are 3, 600 foot towers being built the right now.

Originally Posted by OhioTodd

Apparently this is in addition to the Transbay towers..at least from the talk on SSP.
http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/showthread.php?t=122300

Wow I did know that. Well the more the better

[wynngd]

Thanks for the Info Armon! 3,600 Feet this is really huge tower.
What is this tower???

[Avatar]

wow what an exciting tidbit. Possible good news for SF. I wonder how long it will take for a rendering?

[robertee]

Massive new project being proposed for San Francisco
San Francisco Business Times - 3:21 PM PST Thursday
by J.K. Dineen

A development team led by the Solit Interest Group is proposing to build a 1,200-foot tower at First and Mission streets, part of a quartet of astoundingly ambitious buildings being designed by superstar architect Renzo Piano.

The proposed building, which would dwarf any existing buildings on the West Coast, would be part of a 2.9 million-square-foot development that would include 600 condominiums, 470 hotel rooms, and more than 520,000 square feet of office space, according to an application filed Dec. 21 with the city.

The 1,200-foot proposed skyscraper, which would be the third tallest building in the United States, would lag only Chicago's Sears Tower, which is 1,450 feet, and New York's Empire State Building at 1,250 feet. San Francisco's tallest current building is the Transamerica Pyramid, which is 853 feet tall.

The 51,000-square-foot development site on the northwest corner of First and Mission streets was assembled by David Choo, the president of California Mortgage and Realty. Over the past two years, Choo has acquired four buildings on First Street between Mission and Market streets as well as three adjoining vacant parcels on Mission.

Last summer Choo brought on Mark Solit to head up the development team. Solit was a developer for the Hyatt Corp. and was also involved in building Embarcadero West at 275 Battery St.

The buildings -- 50 First St., 62 First St., 76-80 First St., and 88 First St. -- would be demolished under the proposal. They are all small, Class C office buildings with a combined square footage of 250,000.

At current construction costs, the project would cost more than $1 billion to build.

Piano, who designed the rebuild of the California Academy of Sciences now under way in Golden Gate Park, is a highly sought-after international superstar architect. He's behind the expansion of both the Whitney Museum in New York and the High Museum in Atlanta has public and private projects in Sydney, Tokyo and Paris, but recent American commissions have made him a familiar and golden name in the United States.

"He's certainly one of a very short list of preeminent architects in the world that have a significant body of work," said David Meckel, director research and planning and former dean of architecture at California College of the Arts. "He's done a lot of buildings and almost everyone of those building responds to place. No two look alike."

The proposed development would be made possible by a planned upzoning of the Transbay Terminal area that is currently under review. In July, the Transbay Joint Powers Authority agreed to a plan to build a trio of soaring towers that would help fund a new Transbay Terminal as well as a funding and phasing plan for the transit hub.

The zoning changes could bring as much as $250 million in new funding to the terminal project, according to the work of the planners.

[Skyman]

I guess SF will look much better than LA, of course if the tendency to build such towers will continue in future, it would be nice to make SF the third skyscrapercity of US but anyway the city could be the best on the Westcoast

I hope San Francisco will look something like this very soon

[JRinSoCal]

Originally Posted by wynngd

Thanks for the Info Armon! 3,600 Feet this is really huge tower.
What is this tower???

LOL! I think he meant there are three 600ft towers under construction. Not a 3,600ft tower. That would be like 400 story tower.LOL.

[JoshYent]

nice!

[djm19]

LA cannot allow SF to overthrow it!

[robertee]

Sky's the limit South of Market
4 of developers' proposed high-rises would be taller than anything else in S.F.

John King, Chronicle Urban Design Writer
Friday, December 22, 2006

San Francisco developers are proposing to build the nation's tallest towers outside of New York and Chicago -- a pair of slender high-rises 350 feet taller than the Transamerica Pyramid.

The plan presented Thursday to the city's Planning Department envisions a cluster of thin towers rising from 2 acres at the northwest corner of First and Mission streets. The cluster would include two 1,200-foot towers, two 900-foot structures and a 600-foot companion.

Threaded between them would be an open plaza, covered passageways and a three-story building that is not part of the project.

By comparison, the Transamerica Pyramid is 853 feet high and the Bank of America building is 779 feet. The only U.S. buildings taller than those proposed Thursday are Sears Tower in Chicago and New York's Empire State Building, which are 1,451 feet and 1,250 feet respectively.

Though unprecedented for San Francisco, the proposal is in line with what city officials have been saying for months -- that extremely tall towers will be allowed on a handful of sites south of Market Street. But details of the project are likely to change during the city's review process, which could take at least two years.

Indeed, one member of the development team on Thursday described the "environmental evaluation application" presented to the city as "a placeholder."

"It is highly conceptual at this point," said Mark Solit, the lead developer. "Conceptual in terms of our discussion with the city, and conceptual in terms of the architects' vision of what they think might be appropriate."

The site is across from the Transbay Terminal, itself the focus of a skyscraper design competition seeking what the guidelines describe as "an iconic presence that will redefine the city's skyline." As many as a half-dozen teams are rumored to be putting together bids.

City planners earlier this year suggested raising building heights around the terminal as a way to attract projects that in turn would generate tax revenue. That money could then be used for the terminal and related transit projects such as an extension of commuter rail lines from the Peninsula.

The lead architect for the proposed cluster of towers is Renzo Piano of Italy, who also is doing the new home of the California Academy of Sciences in Golden Gate Park.

Piano has likened the design approach to bamboo shoots rising from the ground, with different pieces stopping at different heights. The two tallest would be on First Street -- rising 1,200 feet on either side of the Jessie Street alleyway.

The height would be accented even more by the narrow dimensions of each tower. On the top 300 feet of the tallest towers, the floors would measure just 8,000 square feet -- less than half the size of the upper floors one block away at Fremont Center. That 600-foot-high office tower is currently the tallest high-rise south of Market Street.

The development site is now parking lots and four six-story buildings built in the decade after the 1906 earthquake.

According to the application, the new buildings would contain 600 residential units, 470 hotel rooms, 520,000 square feet of office space and a small amount of ground-floor retail space. However, Solit said, the final mix would evolve along with the project.

Any project of this scale will require detailed studies of how the buildings will affect the wind and block sunlight, as well as engineering studies to confirm that such tall, narrow towers can withstand a major earthquake.

During the past week, Solit and other members of the development team have shown the project to Supervisors Chris Daly and Aaron Peskin and members of Mayor Gavin Newsom's administration. Full architectural details are not expected before summer.

"If we're going to do these kinds of heights, this is the place," said Daly, who also is a member of the Transbay Joint Powers Authority, which will oversee construction of a new terminal. "I like how the project works on the ground -- it's very porous and attractive to people on the street."

Daly suggested the most controversial aspect of the proposal could be the twin 1,200-foot towers.

"Every American is going to look at them and think of 9/11," he said.

Whatever form the project eventually takes, it shows that decision-makers no longer see dramatic building heights as something to avoid.

This wasn't the case in the decades after the Transamerica Pyramid began construction in 1970; that concrete spike at the foot of Columbus Avenue crystallized opposition to the transformation of San Francisco's skyline. An urban design plan the next year capped heights at 700 feet, and a 1986 update sliced off another 100 feet.

In recent years, though, the city has allowed residential towers in areas that before were kept low -- such as the towers now rising north of the Bay Bridge. Three are under construction, and two will top 600 feet.

San Francisco isn't the only city where the sky is now the limit.

Piano has 1,000-foot buildings in the works for the centers of both London and Boston -- two cities once as tower-wary as San Francisco. In Paris, a 984-foot tower proposal was announced last month for a site 3 miles west of the Eiffel Tower. The architect is Thom Mayne of Santa Monica, who designed the soon-to-open federal complex at Seventh and Mission streets in San Francisco

[TowerPower]

to scale? Dang, they're skinny.

[FROM LOS ANGELES]

Well it feels good for SF to get these towers hopefully, but the city of angels is going to fight back.

[soup or man]

Even though it isn't a competition for tallest in the state of California seeing as how LA has had the tallest buildings for a long time, cool for San Francisco.

[jacobboyer]

If they dont watch out las vegas will catch them both.

[FROM LOS ANGELES]

Well Vegas does have a lot of u/c's and crzy projects, but as soon as Trump arrives in LA the show's over.

[soup or man]

Originally Posted by jacobboyer

If they dont watch out las vegas will catch them both.

Mabye Houston will dust off the blueprints for that 6,000 foot tall tower and own everyone.