TOKYO | JP Tower | 200m | 38 fl | Com

[Momo1435]

JP Tower (ＪＰタワー)

On the site of the former Tokyo Central Post Office in the Marunouchi business district right next to Tokyo Central Station, Japan Post Group is building a 200 meter high office tower. It will be build behind the historic facade of the old building from 1933 that will be restored and will be part of the new complex.

http://www.japanpost.jp/pressrelease...04.pdf　
http://www.eonet.ne.jp/~building-pc/...00jp-tower.htm
http://building-pc.cocolog-nifty.com...post-0116.html

Height: 200.00 meter
stories: 38
design: Mitsubishi Jisho Sekkei, inc. with cooperation from Helmut Jahn
function: office
start construction: 06/2009
completion date: 03/2012





location:
http://maps.google.co.jp/maps?f=q&hl...,0.009645&z=17

English source:
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?p...d=aFC2F4Ch8GiY

March 2009



July 2009


building-pc.cocolog-nifty.com/helicopter/2009/07/post-8c11.html

August 2009, ready to start the full scale foundation works.

Originally Posted by japanese001

郵便局の奥に２００ｍの高層ビルを建設

[Assemblage23]

Great news!

Another 200 mts. building in Tokyo!

[Marco Polo]

Great news indeed

[GreenMonk108]

very nice!

[potipoti]

great place for that building, near Tokyo railway station

[korea2002]

JP Tower means JP Morgan New Headquarter ?? or Japan Tower?
I don't know this building plan.

[Momo1435]

Japan Post Tower.

[Elio di Angelis]

Why don't they bring the train underground?

[Jude12]

Very Simple Design. I love it!

[Momo1435]

Originally Posted by Elio di Angelis

Why don't they bring the train underground?

Easier said then done.

First of all there are already several train and met lines running underground almost under the station. The underground level of the station is even much bigger then what you see on the pictures and on Google Earth. If they want to bring all the lines down they have to go really deep and that's not really practical, not for the construction and also not for the almost 400,000 commuters that pass the station on a daily basis.

It's just not feasible and on top of that it won't be the completely awesome train ride through Tokyo anymore. It's probably the most urban railway line in the world, 8 tracks on a 40 m. wide viaduct with just a few meters of room between the trains and the adjacent buildings.

[mirai]

wow the new japan post tower have a great desing

[nouveau.ukiyo]

Thanks for making this thread. It's pretty rare to see threads about buildings in Tokyo here. Wasn't there some kind of controversy surrounding this project regarding the old JP building i.e. the building had some kind of historical significance because of it's age, history and the general lack of old buildings in Tokyo, so some people didn't want it torn down even if the facade is left up?

[Momo1435]

I don't have a clue if there were any protests.

Before (2008/07/18)



after (2009/08/23)


oer10000.blog72.fc2.com/

The will rebuild the hole later on.

[nouveau.ukiyo]

http://www.asahi.com/english/Herald-...904210050.html

POINT OF VIEW/ Yasuhiko Nishizawa: Our grand old buildings deserve a better fate

THE ASAHI SHIMBUN

2009/4/21

Apparently in response to a public outcry, the Japan Post group abandoned its plan to demolish the historically significant Tokyo Central Post Office building. Instead, it decided to expand parts of the building to be preserved with the aim of registering the edifice as a tangible cultural asset.

Earlier, though, it had stuck stubbornly by its original plan in the face of opposition by Minister of Internal Affairs and Communications Kunio Hatoyama, who called for the building to be preserved. It also ignored a suggestion by the Agency for Cultural Affairs that the famous structure could be designated an important cultural asset.

Clearly this is a case that supports the argument for laws to stop owners trashing cultural treasures made up of bricks and mortar.

The post office building is a landmark of Japanese modernist architecture. When German architect Bruno Taut (1880-1938) saw the structure, completed in 1931, he praised it as a model of new Japanese architecture.

In 1988, architects and researchers around the world founded DOCOMOMO International, currently headquartered in Paris, to recognize the importance of modernism and to take on the challenge of conserving important buildings and documents. In 2000, its local chapter in Japan listed 20 modernist buildings, including the Tokyo Central Post Office building, as landmarks worthy of preservation.

The building is important in another sense. It was one of five historic structures that formed the square in front of JR Tokyo Station. The other buildings are the Marunouchi Building (completed in 1923), the head office of the now-defunct Japanese National Railways (1938), the Shin-Marunouchi Building (1952) and Tokyo Station (1914). Over a period of about 40 years, these edifices came to form a grand and worthy gateway to the nation's capital.

Since the late 1990s, though, the buildings have been successively torn down for modern high-rise replacements. If the Tokyo Central Post Office building is demolished, that famous cityscape will be lost forever. On three occasions, the Architectural Institute of Japan wrote to Japan Post about the significance of the building and called for its preservation and regeneration. The appeals fell on deaf ears.

Building owners and developers frequently claim that old buildings lack modern conveniences, or that they're a danger to the community because they weren't designed to resist major earthquakes. They also assert that whenever these buildings haven't been registered as cultural assets, it's proof that they must lack cultural value.

The truth is, however, proponents of demolition rarely ask experts to assess the structures. Take, for example, Asahigaoka Senior High School in Nagoya, Aichi Prefecture. I joined local residents and graduates who were calling for the preservation of the school building.

However, partly because of the support of politicians and influential members of the community, the Aichi prefectural board of education razed the structure on grounds it wasn't adequately equipped for an earthquake and had become decrepit. Despite the fact the concrete building, erected in 1938, was still strong, the board went ahead and tore it down--without even carrying out a seismic capacity evaluation.

Having been involved in a number of these disputes, I have seen firsthand that legal measures to protect historically important buildings are utterly inadequate. There are several stipulations, such as the Building Standards Law, in place to guide the construction of new buildings, but no laws to regulate their demolition. In other words, developers are free to tear them down in whichever way they please.

To remedy this situation, we need a system that can estimate the impact of a demolition on the community and its cultural consciousness, among other things.

To ensure citizen participation, the city planning law allows nonprofit organizations and other groups involved in city planning to have a say about development proposals as soon as they go public. This law could be used as the basis of a new system that obliges owners of high-profile edifices to publicize their demolition plans and submit their buildings to the assessment of independent experts. These people would evaluate the potential impact of the demolition and then make their findings public.

I tentatively call the system "architectural assessment." As well as evaluating the impact of demolition, it should be used to study and assess proposals for preservation, restoration and reuse of buildings. As a first step toward the creation of such a system, the Architectural Institute of Japan proposed Guidelines for Building Assessment, Preservation and Utilization in 2007.

In this century, it is essential that we practice sustainable city planning. When we lazily break and discard things, they become garbage, but when we put them to proper use, they become a long-lasting resource. This is why we should be striving to create a society that can use existing buildings for as long as possible, instead of endlessly tearing them down and replacing them.

* * *

The author is associate professor of architectural history at Nagoya University.(IHT/Asahi: April 21,2009)

[Momo1435]

10/11, a view from the back side.


blue-style.com

[Momo1435]

Recent pictures.


houseco.jp/






oer10000.blog72.fc2.com/

[friedemann]

Momo, do you know something about the status of this 250m Loop Line Building? Is it already approved?

btw, thanks for the update!

[Chad]

Great addition to the Tokyo Station !

[Caravaggio]

This is an mazing project,maybe not the most bold architecture but definitely a great addition to the city.

[Momo1435]

Originally Posted by friedemann

Momo, do you know something about the status of this 250m Loop Line Building? Is it already approved?

In July this year Mori Building Co., Ltd was chosen by the Tokyo Metropolitan Office as the designated builder for this project, now they only need to gain approval of the national Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism.
http://www.mori.co.jp/en/company/pre...521.html#-/-/1

If they get permission they will start in November 2010.


Mori states on their website that it's only 247m high, but the actual height could be 250m as the Japanese developers often give the height of the highest ceiling or don't take into account that the building is located on a slope.