Building Spires. Should they be counted in a building's height?

I personally think the ceiling roof is the final height. I think like this. If I built a building that is 1,000 feet tall = 300 meters high to the roof, then I put up a spire or antenna that is 655 feet tall = 200 meters.
Now I have a skyscraper that is 500 meters tall, thats 1640 feet tall.

But I will always see the building as 1000 feet tall.
It might be nice to have a spire or antenna as a supplement rather than an observation deck atop the skyscraper, and you can count how high the building is the spire included, but the final height will be the height of the roof of any building.

I think Kanto who is a member here calls himself "roof height crusader" and I agree with him on this.

It really does depend how much each person values 'height'

WTC being called a 500m+ tower when it is really a 400m tower was silly in the first place. Maybe the change to an antenna would save the US some face when people realise how long the stick actually is?

I think people should be more formal when addressing 'height'. I always separate them into two main categories:

-Structural height

-Height to highest floor

If you can separate the two, then there shouldn't really be any conflicts of interest.

Spires are to accompany some towers. If we start removing the spires, then the next move will be to remove the crowns etc etc...

I don't like towers because of their height btw so all in, it doesn't affect me

I think the spires can always be included in the height, but official should be only counted toward the building's elements. A roof (even slanted) or facade elements (glass extensions such as the ones on the Shard) are ok, but everything else is just a nice addition (such as the crowns on Dubai's skyscrapers).
1WTC was disappointing once I noticed that a lot of its height is "fake".

Here is the proof that roof, top floor, and pinnacle are the only objective measurements


Look at this image below, if you go by CTBUH standards, the building in the middle with the huge white spire is 550m. If you go by Roof height it's 300m, and top floor height would put it around 300m. This image shows the flaws of CTBUH measurements.






Now if you look at my image of the Sears Tower on the left, it shows that by CTBUH measurements, this 300m building with a 250m spire would be taller then the massive Sears Tower which has a roof height of 442 meters, this proves that top floor is the best measurement. Nonetheless you still have to count the Burj Khalifa, so how should this all work out ? Well I propose they have a measurement where anything above the top floor, must be atleast 50% of the width below it to count, and must have a total width of more than 30 feet to count.

I add the second requirement, so that we don't have thin spires like those on the Petronas tower count

1WTC was disappointing once I noticed that a lot of its height is "fake".[/QUOTE]

Me too I was so disappointing that I was angry and sad.
The roof height is the most important in my eyes but you can have a spire or antenna and count that also as long as the FINAL height is the roof. Thats my opinion

OK, during today I was working on a height measurement system, which would enable to get a roof height even out of buildings as Burj Khalifa or Abby. As classicrock stated above, using relative width is the way to go to eliminate cheating sticks, a.k.a. spires, while leaving aspects like crowns as wide as the building itself counted, simply because they look like a part of the building, not like just a thin steel stick on the building. The system goes as it follows and I'd like to hear opinions of as many people as possible about it:

Spires and antennas aren't counted in this model

A spire/antenna (therefore a structural element that doesn't count) is determined by 2 relative numerical rules similar to the relative numerical rule that 50% of a building must be habitable in order for the building to be classified as a skyscraper.

According to these rules a spire/antenna is a structural element which has a width less than 20% of the width, which the building has at 25% of its pinnacle height, this would mark a spire/antenna limit above which there is a spire/antenna and below which there is the building itself.

Only exceptions are if:
a, There is a habitable floor in an area normaly considered a spire/antenna
b, The building continues to taper above the spire/antenna limit with angles id tapered before the spire/antenna, then a triangle is made between the two border points of the spire/antenna limit and the top of the section in which the tapering angles from below the spire/antenna limit still apply. If the top angle of this triangle is more than 30°, then that part can be still counted towards the roof

I made a picture showing this new method of mine with the roof heights written in red with red horizontal lines being roof heights, violet lines being spire/antenna limits and horizontal/vertical red lines being the lines of the triangle described above.

Feedback on this system is very welcome and would certainly help me perfect my system to hopefully one day reach a state in which it can be viewed as a viable alternative to the CTBUH official height system :cheers:

patrykus said:

1. Why do you count crowns?
2. Why don't you count Mokka tower completely (There are offices even in the crescent)?

Click to expand...

I count crowns because they are big and appear as a part of the building, not just a thin steel stick on the building. In my opinion crowns and parapets should be counted, but spires and antennas should be not :cheers:

As for Abby, I don't know where it has its top occupied floor. If it has occupied floors even above the roof height I have made in that picture, then the roof height should be increased based on my 1st exception law which dictates that if there is an occupied floor in a thin section that thin section is still a part of the building and counts towards roof height. Pretty much like ESB, which has a roof height of 381 meters in my opinion :cheers:

Btw, you know where Abby has its top occupied floor? Plz tell me so that I can update my diagram :cheers:

^^ But at which height are they in that crescent?

As to Burj Khalifa, I had to somewhere draw the line from where the 20% should be counted. Because I wanted to make even fatter spires not count, but didn't want to get into problems with possible podiums, I decided the 25% will be the ideal number :cheers:

Answer me this: you count crowns because they look like part of the building, why don't you count the burj spire which aslo look like a part of it?

the crescent, here you go:

Kanto said:

^^ Because the top of Burj Khalifa gets way too thin as it goes up :cheers:

Click to expand...

But it is your words, you count the part of the building which look like a part of it. How can you say burj is 700m when continuous part of the building goes much higher.

Kanto said:

Btw, by crescent I thought you meant the whole spire. That pic is just kinda hard to believe, you sure it isn't a joke? :|

Click to expand...

It isn't a joke, it has been posted in abraj ssc thread.

Kanto, read this!

I like what you started there Kanto, but the Burj actually looks 828 meters tall when you look at it, compared to 1 WTC which looks like a 417m building. So here is what I propose that solves our problems, I think that we should eventually work together to make a good system, then make a website for it. I am going to college to be an architect, so it would be right up my alley...

Here is the system I propose.

Spires, antennae, and structural addition's that sit on a flat roof only count if they cover more then 50% of the roof's width. Here is an example to explain this




Now, there is one more requirement for spires/antennae's etc... It must have a width of more then 30 feet

Here is the result

RED - Actual Height

Black - Pinnacle




So here are the rules to start, it will get more complex as we combine my system and Kanto's, to figure out a good system.

Rule 1 - Spires, antennae, and structural addition's that sit on a flat roof only count if they cover more then 50% of the roof's width
Rule 2 - It must have a width of more then 30 feet



Let me know if any of my diagrams are wrong due to their being floors in a spire or any other problems.


Taipei 101 and Jin Mao Tower are a WIP

patrykus said:

Answer me this: you count crowns because they look like part of the building, why don't you count the burj spire which aslo look like a part of it?

the crescent, here you go:

Click to expand...

If this impression is true, then the building should definitely count upto at least half way up the crescent. It should pass muster with the 30ft width rule as well.

Although I'm still waiting for some hard confirmation that there are actually offices in the structure.

HardBall said:

If this impression is true, then the building should definitely count upto at least half way up the crescent. It should pass muster with the 30ft width rule as well.

Although I'm still waiting for some hard confirmation that there are actually offices in the structure.

Click to expand...

There are floors inside the spire, so the whole spire counts.

I'm glad someone started a thread to talk specifically about spire/antenna issues, because the One World Trade Center was becoming hijacked lol..As I've stated before, I do NOT think spires/antennas should be counted towards final height, on 99% of skyscrapers. If that flawed logic was followed, anyone could stick a big ass spire on top of a short building and claim it to be the world's tallest. Most buildings have a clear, visual, structural roof, like 1WTC, Shanghai Financial Center, etc. This is what should be measured as real height. The spires are just window dressing...The Burj Dubai is an unusual case because the top is SO spindly and the setbacks are so numerous near the roof that it is visually hard to tell where the structural part ends and where the spire would begin...In the Burj's case, I would count the spire as roof height, because the entirety of the top part is so narrow and visually hard to discern. However, in 99% of skyscrapers, there is usually a clear visual top of roof. So I will count 1WTC's height as 1368/1374 feet. Period. Want a higher building? Build higher to roof level. Simple.