Title: The Skyscraper: Epitome of Human Aspirations

Author: Mir Ali, Professor, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Subjects: Architectural/DesignSocial Issues

Keywords: FormRedevelopmentUrbanization

Publication Date: 2005

Original Publication: CTBUH 2005 7th World Congress, New York

Paper Type: 1. Book chapter/Part chapter2. Journal paper3. Conference proceeding4. Unpublished conference paper5. Magazine article6. Unpublished

© Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat / Mir Ali

ctbuh.org/papers

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Mir Ali obtained his Ph.D. in structural engineering from the University of Waterloo in Canada andis currently professor of architectural structures at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Hepreviously served as chairman of the Structures Division of the School of Architecture. He is a registeredstructural engineer in Illinois and a fellow of the American Society of Civil Engineers. He received ASCE’sMillennium Challenge Prize in 1999 for his article on skyscrapers in a nation-wide competition.

Dr. Ali has considerable industrial and consulting experience. He worked with Skidmore, Owings & Merrill andSargent & Lundy in Chicago. He has worked as consultant in Canada, Singapore, Bangladesh, and the UnitedStates. He has designed and worked with responsible charge on more than 100 building projects. He workedas a consultant with U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and was chairman of Committee 30-Architecture of theCouncil on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat. He is currently a Group Leader of its Group PA-Planning andArchitecture. His research interests are in tall buildings, underground structures, and building design againstnatural disasters, e.g., floods, wind, and earthquakes. Dr. Ali has designed several buildings in seismic zones,and published papers and given seminars on seismic design.

He was also a TOKTEN Fellow of the United Nations in 1989. He has authored one book, Art of the Skyscraper:The Genius of Fazlur Khan; and edited three books, Architecture of Tall Buildings, Bangladesh Floods: Views fromHome and Abroad, and Catalyst for Skyscraper Revolution: Lynn S. Beedle — A Legend in His Lifetime. He iscurrently working on a new book, Skyscraper and the City: Design, Technology, and Innovations, co-authoredby Lynn S. Beedle and Paul J. Armstrong.

The Skyscraper: Epitome of Human AspirationsSkyscrapers impact the balance of an urban environment and represent one of the most important mediumsdrawing public attention and epitomizing citizens’ pride in their cities. They represent a significant buildingtypology that continues to grow all over the world. Focus on the skyscraper’s form and responsiveness to thequality of its surroundings and its urban and environmental impact, as well as its own functional program, isessential to a designer.

The period following the Second World War saw a proliferation of international-style tall buildings that quicklybecame appropriated as the modern symbols of economic prosperity and growth. In the 1950s and 1960s,urban renewal policies were introduced in the United States in order to reverse the trend of widespread decayand deterioration of cities. The federal government organized the urban renewal program to reinvigorateparts of urban America. This was discredited in the mid-1960s, and critics have questioned the wisdom andappropriateness of tall buildings. Recently, however, urban renewal has become an increasing priority again.Concentrated population increases, scarcity and cost of real estate, and technological innovations havebrought urban redevelopment back into focus.

This presentation will discuss the underlying human striving towards something higher to conquer space, aswell as psychological motivations for designing skyscrapers and not so much their craftsmanship and artistry.The discussion will demonstrate how skyscrapers fit into the changing city fabric all over the world. Theconclusion will be drawn that they represent human aspirations and are inseparable from the permeableurban fabric and public life.

Mir M. Ali, Ph.D., P.E., FASCEUniversity of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

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THE SKYSCRAPER: EPITOME OF HUMAN ASPIRATIONS

Mir M. Ali Professor

School of Architecture University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Champaign, IL 61820 USA

e-mail: mirali1@uiuc.edu Telephone: 217-244-8011

Fax: 217-244-2900

Member, CTBUH Steering Committee Group Leader, Group PA: Planning and Architecture

ABSTRACT Skyscrapers impact the balance of an urban environment and represent one of the most important mediums drawing public attention and epitomizing the citizens’ pride in their cities. They represent a significant building typology that continues to grow all over the world. Focus on the skyscraper’s form and responsiveness to the quality of its surroundings and its urban and environmental impact, as well as its own functional program is essential to the designer. In the 1950s and 1960s urban renewal policies were introduced in the U.S. to reverse the trend of widespread decay and deterioration of cities. This was discredited since the mid-1960s and critics have questioned the wisdom and appropriateness of tall buildings. Recently, however, urban renewal has become an increasing priority again. This paper discusses the underlying human striving towards something higher to conquer space and psychological motivations for designing skyscrapers and not so much their craftsmanship and artistry. Key Words: Tall building, form-giving, design, psychology, urban redevelopment

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Tall buildings in the form of framed construction were born in the late 19th century in America. Subsequently, in the mid-20th century, celebrated architects like Mies van der Rohe and Le Corbusier developed exemplary models that embodied the industrial-engineering professions with architectural meaning. Technology in the form of steel frames, elevators and foundations led to the development of skyscraper for which an architectural essence germinated out of necessity. It was not developed because of the arbitrary wish of the architect but due to the social and economic needs to minimize the problems of population density of a city. While the skyscraper presupposed a direct linkage between scientific know how, industrial production and typological form, it also simultaneously represented a programmatic solution for sheltering human activity related to industrialization and business. It rejuvenated the urban center comprising offices and commercial activities. SYMBOLISM AND IMAGEABILITY Tall buildings are perceived by people in different ways. They are viewed by the architect who designs them, the contractor who builds them, the engineer who engineers them, the corporation that finances them and the neighborhood in which they exist—all from their own viewpoints. At a national level, the tallest building symbolizes national prestige in the form of economic status, growth, technological prosperity and modernity. For those who own, live in or work in tall buildings, these towers symbolize wealth, social status and prestige. According to developer Donald Trump (National Geographic, 1989),

Ego is a very important part of the building of skyscrapers. . . . It’s probably a combination of ego and desire for financial gain. I mean, once you have enough money so that you can eat and live, then ego enters into it. It’s involved with the building not only of skyscrapers but all great buildings whether they are tall or not.

Since tall buildings are most visible in the city’s skyline, their symbolic value can be very strong. Individual emotions and feelings enter into the design of any building; albeit these feelings are magnified at the larger scale of tall buildings. Tall buildings can epitomize people’s pride in their city, or, people’s disdain of just another eyesore. People who oppose tall buildings think of them as rat cages in which people live or work and as an encroachment into the natural landscape of the “city beautiful.” In their eyes they create a claustrophobic social environment when they become ultra-tall, plus they result in diminishing pleasure of views when people are literally in the clouds. However, humanity has a pre-occupation with building large and building tall defying gravity. Architect Cesar Pelli observed, “Part of it is the human element. That’s why a tall TV tower isn’t so important. When we see humans in a building, and know there are eyes up there, that’s the emotional connection. Tall has power” (Gluckman, 2003). Skyscrapers often are associated with the concern of imageability by designers, planners, owners, users and the public. Imageability is the extent to which a building contributes to the general impression of a city, district or neighborhood. Lynch (1960, 1984) first introduced this concept and concluded how people perceived cities visually—landmarks, edges, paths, nodes and districts. Skyscrapers often serve as landmarks and reference points to a city. It is hard to imagine Chicago without the Sears Tower (Fig. 1) and John Hancock Center. Similarly, for New York the Empire State Building holding the tallest building of the world title for a long time was a great symbol (Fig. 2). The World Trade Center (WTC) Towers soaring even higher represented New York for three decades. The two towers together acted as a gateway to New York City. Without them now there is a large vacuum at that site. Other buildings of iconic character are the Bank of China (Fig. 3) and Hong Kong Shanghai Bank buildings in Hong Kong, Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur (Fig. 4), Jin Mao Tower in Shanghai and the recently completed Taipei 101 in Taipei (Fig. 5).

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Fig. 1: Sears Tower Fig. 2: Empire State Building (Source: Art of the Skyscraper (Source: http://www.arch.tu-dresden.de) by Mir M. Ali; Photo by Ezra Stoller /Esto)

Fig. 3: Bank of China Fig. 4: Petronas Towers (Source: Architecture of Tall Buildings, (Photo by Abbas Aminmansour) Mir M. Ali and Paul J. Armstrong Ed., CTBUH Monograph 30)

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Public images of tall buildings are, of course, influenced by the mass media, particularly when accidents and fires take place in them. The WTC collapse caused by terrorist attack on September 11, 2001 is a case in point. Similarly, public fear of skyscrapers is also aggravated after major natural disasters like hurricanes and earthquakes. Tall buildings are also depicted by the media in a positive light. The luxury of penthouse apartments and the exhilaration of offices in the sky with commanding city views are promoted in films and television shows. People also suffer from fears and phobias in particular when the skyscraper has an unusual scale. While most people adjust readily or gradually toward tall buildings, some do not. Individuals with agoraphobia (fear of open spaces), acrophobia (fear of high places), and other types of phobias are often troubled by skyscrapers (Ali and Armstrong, 1995). Fear of heights is sometimes related to fear of airplanes and flying. Keeping this in mind, to give a feeling of safety to occupants, architect Minoru Yamasaki arranged the perimeter steel columns of the World Trade Center in New York only 22 in. (56 cm) apart.

Fig.5: Taipei 101 (Source: Civil Engineering, January 2004; Photo courtesy: Evergreen Consulting Engineering, Inc.) Most architects often respond to aesthetic qualities of the building for demonstrating their artistic capabilities and for acceptability of skyscrapers by the public. They are concerned about style, form, design approach, design statement and historical context. On the other hand, non-architects often view buildings in terms of physical features and their role in the urban context. Uncoordinated layout of skyscrapers across cities may cause severe damage to the imagery of cities. Skylines form the local emblem for the city besides being symbols of an industrialized civilization. Protection of the goodness of skyline is a common worry for planners, architects and city officials because any mistake will permanently damage the skyline. FORM FOLLOWS FEELINGS One of the well-known dictums in architecture is the famous expression “form must follow function” coined by the Chicago architect Louis Sullivan. It is clear why the building’s form has to cater to its functional needs. To structural engineer and form-giver Fazlur Khan, architectural treatment of buildings did not mean adding superficial features to structures or modifying logical structural forms with texture, grooves, offsets, and other cosmetics on the façade (Ali, 2001). He used engineering principles to generate form. His dictum was: let stresses in materials shape the structure. This concept was articulated by Billington (1983) who rephrased it as: “form controls the forces . . . this means that function follows form and not the reverse.” This tenet is particularly true for tall buildings and other large structures where the forces are of enormous magnitude. There is yet another determinant of tall building’s form—it is the economic dimension. This notion is presented in a book by Carol Willis (1995) in which she introduces the dictum: “form follows finance.” This is undeniable insofar as the height of the tall building and complexity of form are directly related to the cost-benefit analysis for the project. All the above three dictums apply to the generation of form of tall buildings, but there is one more that is not so tangible as function, forces or finance—and that is human emotion and feelings. Pride, envy,

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competitiveness, vision, insight and intuition—these are attributes and faculties of the human mind and they play key roles in form-giving. For the owner, it is his/her dream, pride, competitiveness or vision. For the architect it is all of these attributes. In the early 20th century, Frank Woolworth, the renowned businessman of New York known as the “Store King” wanted to build a skyscraper in that city. When in Europe on a tour, he kept hearing about the Singer Building, how majestic and lofty it was at 612 ft (187m)! Singer was toppled by the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company building that was 700 ft (213m) tall due to the great aspirations of its president John Hegerman (Bascomb, 2003). Woolworth wanted to build something grand and towering. Initially, he wanted to build a 620 ft (189m) tower beating the Singer Building but he remained discontent since the Metropolitan Building would be taller than his. Here is the conversation between him and his architect, Cass Gilbert (Bascomb, 2003):

“How high do you want the tower now?” asked Mr. Gilbert. “How high can you make it?” Mr. Woolworth asked in reply. “It is for you to make the limit,” said Mr. Gilbert. “Then make it fifty feet higher than the Metropolitan Tower.”

The 792-ft (241m) tall Woolworth Building was formally opened on April 24, 1913 at 7:30 p.m. with fanfare when President Woodrow Wilson pressed a button in Washington and 80,000 lights instantly flashed throughout the Woolworth Building in New York in presence of large crowds and invited guests. The story of Chrysler Tower is no different. Walter Chrysler, the automobile man, wanted to build a monument for himself and had retained architect Van Alen, who had designed the tower that was built to surpass previous height records, and at 1046 ft (319m) became the tallest building in the world in 1930. This record was quickly broken by the Empire State Building in 1931 that rose to 1250 ft (381m). Empire State was the brainchild of John Jacob Raskob, Vice President of General Motors. Raskob’s original plan was to build a 30-story tower, but once he saw the other skyscrapers breaking records, particularly the Chrysler Tower by another motor man, he changed his mind (Goldman, 1980).

. . . the temptation was too much for Raskob. He and Smith might have lost their campaign for president (of the United States) but that was another race they could win. Besides, one acquaintance said, “It burned Raskob to think the French has built something (the Eiffel Tower) higher than anything we had in this great country of ours”. . . . John J. (Raskob) reached into a drawer and pulled out one of those big fat pencils schoolchildren liked to use. He held it up and he said to Bill Lamb (the architect): “Bill, how high can you make it so that it won’t fall down?”

Chrysler Tower and Empire State Building not only symbolized the egotistic personalities behind them, but also were symbolic of a desire to create an aura of prosperity and optimism providing a contrast to the severely depressed economy of the country at that time. The race for height continued after them with the World Trade Center [1368 ft (417m)], Sears Tower [1454 ft (443m)], Petronas Towers [1483 ft (452m)] and Taipei 101 [1667 ft (508m)]. Most of these heights were achieved because of pride and competition overriding economic and technical considerations. In the end, it was human feeling that triumphed. The role of the architects and engineers must not be underestimated in all these developments. How can forms for tall buildings be developed? Unlike artists who usually have a single-step operation like painting, music or poetry, an architect has to deal with all stages of the building design and construction, starting with the concept to schematic design to the completion of the project. He/she needs to deal with many professionals with many minds and collaborate with them. All physical systems must be integrated. The architect inevitably must have a holistic outlook about the whole project. Le Corbusier and Walter Gropius urged utility, straight lines and technology. This synchronized with the vision of Mies van der Rohe. During the 1960s and 1970s Modernism, which was based on this ideology, became the popular architectural movement. To others, buildings stripped of any decoration were tantamount to the loss of the architect’s soul away from goodness. To Louis Sullivan, a tall building must embrace the quality of

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verticality. “It must be tall, every inch of it tall. The force and power of altitude must be in it, the glory and pride of exaltation must be in it. It must be every inch a proud and soaring thing” (Sullivan, 1896). Another Chicago architect of the late 19th century was John Wellborn Root. His vision came from the American commercial milieu. His Monadnock Building of 1891 in Chicago—a 16-story masonry building that stands today—is a powerful brick structure and one of Chicago’s historic landmarks. About the same time, William Le Baron Jenney, another Chicago architect, designed the 10-story Home Insurance Building of 1885 in Chicago, considered to be the first skyscraper (demolished in 1931). It incorporated a steel-and-iron structural system that was revolutionary in that it was the first framed construction and it demonstrated how the structure could determine the form. It was the harbinger of future skyscraper construction. Beginning with 1920 to about the end of World War II, tall building design went in the hands of New York architects, where the building form returned to historical models with Art Deco Style and decorative architecture. Woolworth Building, Chrysler Tower, the Empire State Building and many others are the product of this era. Following this period, skyscraper design returned once again to Chicago, where the structural traditions of the Chicago School were revived by Myron Goldsmith, Bruce Graham and Fazlur Khan. They propagated the earlier vision and tenets of Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, who saw the novelty of the tall building type with structural expression as the basis for a new style. He wrote (Mies van der Rohe, 1922):

Skyscrapers reveal their bold structural pattern during construction. Only then does the gigantic steel web seem impressive. When the outer walls are in place, the structural system, which is the basis of all artistic design, is hidden by a chaos of meaningless and trivial forms. When finished, these buildings are impressive only because of their size; yet they could be more than mere examples of our technical ability. Instead of solving new problems with old forms, we should develop new forms from the very nature of new problems. . . .

Mies is known widely for his famous aphorism “less is more” because he wanted the building skeleton not to be covered by unnecessary ornamentation and décor. Robert Venturi, on the other hand, challenged Miesean assertions of the cultural centrality of technology and his aphorism “less is more.” In his book Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture, he stated (Venturi, 1977):

. . . The doctrine “less is more” bemoans complexity and justifies exclusion for expressive purposes . . . (the architect) can exclude important considerations only at the risk of separating architecture from the experience of life and needs of society . . . . Mies’s exquisite pavilions have had valuable implications for architecture, but their selectiveness of content and language is their limitation as well as their strength . . . . Blatant simplication means bland architecture. Less is a bore.

Such thoughts and feelings brought about the nostalgia among architects to revisit the old historical and eclectic models of architecture. Flood-gates of new design ideas were released. In the 1980s and 1990s, a pluralistic Post-Modern style revolting against the Modernist “glass box” architecture became popular, dramatically altering the American skyline. It had the far reaching consequences in other parts of the world as well. The design since then has been characterized by ornamentation, arbitrary forms, sculptural imagery, monumental expression and polychromatic color schemes. Philosophically speaking, the tall building type represents a cultural form reflecting the spiritual, psychological and creative aspirations of mankind in the context of our urban civilization. The best way to designing skyscrapers is still open to professional debate. The architect’s role in designing them is a point of contention, especially on the matter of form-giving. The architect is often viewed as a generalist who must know and understand many disciplines, transcending the technological constraints that may limit the architect’s imagination and design vision. Despite the fact that the form of a tall building must be

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determined from structural and other technical considerations, it must also be closely linked to the architect’s design instinct, inspiration and aspirations—all elements of the psyche. The rational structural logic of the form must be connected to its emotive beauty and the visual perception of the public. BUILDING’S INTERIOR Human psychology is an important controlling element in other facets of tall building design. Prior to the invention of fluorescent light in 1938, office buildings were typically made to allow for natural light. The Marquette Building of 1894 in Chicago, designed by Holabird & Roche established an operative depth of 26 ft (8m) for other future buildings. This would allow for sufficient light and ventilation of the workplace. Using this dimension, but doubling it around a central hallway, L-, E-, or U-shaped and staggered plans, new skyscrapers began to appear. Engineer Frederick Winslow Taylor published in 1911 Principles of Scientific Management, which was readily applied in every center of industrial labor in the world (Abalos and Herreros, 2003). This had a profound effect on interior space planning of office buildings. Taylor’s method consists of four essential steps: analysis of traditional labor and the separate tasks needed to execute its breakdown of each activity into smallest units of movement; tracking the movement and tools using timekeeping methods; and adjustment of movements and tools considering average execution times followed by redesign of the entire process in the form of a linked chain of tasks. Thus the managers, rather than workers, took the predominant position in the office. The rigidity of Taylorist office gradually gave rise to worker resentment and isolation and resulted in a less hierarchical and more flexible and participatory style of management. Inspired by Freudian psychology related to deprivation and repression and as a result of the reaction against Taylor’s attitude toward the worker during the 1930s and 1940s, new management theories in the United States emphasize employee motivation through giving them importance and not treating them as merely part of the production line. Experimental studies have underlined the psychological origin of design errors. Beginning in 1959, the needs of the individual to a new sequence of priorities were restored in which psychological goals associated with comfort and self-esteem were assigned topmost priority followed by social goals and self-fulfillment. This new open concept increased the building’s footprint dimensions, and the need for close interaction and communication among employees in one place allowed tall buildings to be the desirable building type. Like the office spaces, a tall building’s entries, lobbies and atria also play a key role in boosting the spirit of its users. As for the sky-high façade and crown of a tall building, its stylistic centerpiece at the ground level, that is, the architectural details around the immediate outside and the inside of the entry opening and the approach and surroundings of the lobby must be laden with symbolism. The architect knows that at the end of the day, no matter how grand the building may look from the street, if the interior of the building does not evoke an uplifting emotional response in the users and visitors, the attractiveness and rentability of the building are lost. Similarly, a well-landscaped and carefully designed plaza environment around the building provides a cheerful experience for the public and a joyous plaza and street life. Investigation on building entries by B. A. Bain in 1989 at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign indicated that a sense of place and clarity are the principal markers of a successful entry (Ali and Armstrong, 1995). Bain states: “Rather than having a concern for comfort and emotional well-being of those who use a space, it seems that making an architectural `statement` is often more important. The user, as a result, is possibly being left lost, disoriented, and without a strong association with the environment that he or she must use.” In the context of a skyscraper that accommodates a large population, the architect must consider thoroughly the pedestrian traffic movement for entry design. As for entries, building lobby spaces also reflect the architect’s signature in a highly visible manner and assume tremendous psychological and symbolic significance. People often meet in the lobby and find each other. Such meetings may involve waiting since the parties rarely arrive at the same time. The architect must design the lobby carefully considering this fact so people can sit there while waiting and have a comfortable and enjoyable time.

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The energy crisis of the 1970s triggered a movement to design energy-efficient buildings. One chief concern of the architects was to allow for maximum day lighting by creating large glazed atriums to save power and provide passive solar heating. Atrium spaces also provide enough plant life found in outdoors only. Also, atrium floors can be used for decoration and displays, holiday festivities. HAUNTED ARCHITECTURE On February 26, 1993 a tower of the WTC in New York was struck by a powerful explosion. The bomb ripped a huge crater in the buildings’ underground parking garage that measured 200 x 100 ft (61 x 30.5m) by five stories deep. Six people were killed and over 1000 wounded. Four hours later, a bomb threat forced the evacuation of the Empire State Building. No bomb was found, yet all major tall buildings in US cities were put on the alert. The WTC towers were closed for about a month for investigation and repairs. This attack prompted intense debate about the safety of tall buildings from terrorist attacks. A variety of issues previously ignored or neglected continued to plague all those involved in planning, designing, building and operating skyscrapers. Images of the injured soot-stained office workers after the WTC disaster and the horrific stories of survivors remained etched in public memory that sparked renewed social and psychological issues. On September 11, 2003 both towers of the same WTC were once again attacked by terrorists using two flying 767 passenger jets as weapons. About 3000 occupants perished and thousands of others below the levels of attack escaped in horror. Following this, the public felt scared to work in tall buildings. Some opponents of tall buildings declared that this was the end of tall building construction, which of course proved to be untrue. Human nature is resilient and people are willing to take risk if the probability of a mishap is low. Height as an expression of human ingenuity is rooted in cultural aspirations. Much discussion ensued for and against building new skyscrapers and about how to design tall buildings that are safe against terror attacks (Ali, 2003). Pessimists drew a bleak picture about the future of tall buildings whereas optimists argued that they are here to stay as a practical necessity and as an expression of urban civilization that mankind has developed over more than a century. They remain the quintessential modern building type blending the vision of the architect and the ingenuity of the engineer. The groundbreaking ceremony for a new 1776-ft (541-m) tall Freedom Tower took place on July 4, 2004. A 20-ton slab of granite was installed as a cornerstone with the inscription “the enduring spirit of freedom.” The full inscription reads: To honor and remember those who lost their lives on September 11th, 2001 and as a tribute to the enduring spirit of freedom—July Fourth, 2004. The tower will be the world’s tallest building. The completion date of the building is 2009. The developer had plans for four more towers to be built during 2009-2015. The complete plans at the site include a memorial for the disaster victims, a rail hub, and a cultural space including several small theaters. The design, however, continues to evolve at this writing. There has been intense debate about the issue in regard to those who will conduct business at a site of martyrs indelibly marked by catastrophe. It is a delicate balancing act: how to conduct business there? Can workers overcome the psychological burdens of laboring within what is for so many a graveyard? Glanz and Lipton (2003) gave the following description of this:

The power of these haunted things would also help explain why the remains of the World Trade Center—its wrecked steel and ductwork and piping and shiny aluminum cladding—would never be dealt with quite rationally. The immeasurable importance of those remains, the preciousness of messages they carried from the inferno on September 11, could not be confronted squarely without facing the howls of the dead in every buckled strut or beam that had once sheltered humanity.

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URBAN RENEWAL AND TALL BUILDINGS Following World War II, in the 1950s and 1960s urban renewal policies were introduced in the U.S. to reverse the trend of widespread decay and deterioration of cities. Tall buildings were popular at that time, since they were symbols of economic prosperity. This was discredited in the mid-1960s and cities questioned the wisdom of constructing tall buildings, although it continued until the early 1970s. Recently, however, the renewal of urban infrastructure has become a priority. New buildings are replacing older, outmoded ones. Concentrated population increase, scarcity and cost of real estate, and technological breakthroughs have brought urban redevelopment into focus. Urban renewal has taken a new form involving a mix of renovation, selective demolition, commercial development, and tax incentives. It continues to evolve as successes and failures are examined and new models are tested and executed. Lower Manhattan, New York, is a good example of urban renewal. It involves limited public parking, encouraging mass transit, parks and public space. A civic organization called Rebuild Downtown Our Town (R.DOT) saw the destruction of WTC as an opportunity to create a new sustainable vision for the downtown area. In the renewal effort of the WTC site, pedestrian traffic has re-shaped the organization of the street grid. The proposed Freedom Tower with its energy-conscious design and eye for safety against deliberate attacks will rejuvenate the entire region. The destruction of WTC has not dampened human spirit and aspirations for the city to rebuild to a greater height. The skyscraper will continue to fix the identity of the city by defining its skyline where the city meets the sky. ACKNOWLEDGMENT The author wishes to thank Puja Mohandas, a graduate student in the School of Architecture, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, for her help in producing this paper in its final form. REFERENCES Abalos, I. and Herreros, J., 2003 TOWER AND OFFICE: MODERNIST THEORY TO CONTEMPORARY PRACTICE, The MIT Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts. Ali, M. M. and Armstrong, P. J., Editors, 1995 ARCHITECTURE OF TALL BUILDINGS, Chapter 6, Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat Monograph 30, McGraw-Hill, New York. Ali, M. M., 2001 ART OF THE SKYSCRAPER: THE GENIUS OF FAZLUR KHAN, Rizzoli Publications, New York. Ali, M. M., 2003 INTEGRATED DESIGN OF SAFE SKYSCRAPERS: PROBLEMS, CHALLENGES AND PROSPECTS, Proceedings CIB-CTBUH International Conference on Tall Buildings—Strategies for Performance in the Aftermath of the World Trade Center, Kuala Lumpur, October 20-23. Bascomb, N., 2003 HIGHER: A HISTORIC RACE TO THE SKY AND THE MAKING OF A CITY, Doubleday, New York. Billington, D. P., 1983 THE TOWER AND THE BRIDGE: THE NEW ART OF STRUCTURAL ENGINEERING, Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey. Glanz, J. and Lipton, E., 2003 CITY IN THE SKY: THE RISE AND FALL OF WORLD TRADE CENTER, Times Books, Henry Holt and Company, p. 336. Gluckman, R., 2003

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HOW HIGH WILL THEY BUILD?, Popular Science, March, pp. 60-71. Goldman, J., 1980 THE EMPIRE STATE BUILDING BOOK, St. Martin’s Press, New York. Lynch, K., 1960 THE IMAGE OF THE CITY, MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass. Lynch, K., 1984 GOOD CITY FORM, MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass. Mies van der Rohe, L., 1922 TWO GLASS SKYSCRAPERS, originally published in Früucht, vol. 1, pp. 122-124, reprinted in 1978 in P. Johnson, Mies van der Rohe. National Geographic, 1989 SKYSCRAPERS, February, pp. 149-173. Sullivan, L. H., 1896 THE TALL OFFICE BUILDING ARTISTICALLY CONSIDERED, first published in Lippincott’s 57, March; reprinted in 1947 in Sullivan, Kindergarten Chats and Other Writings, George Wittenborn, New York. Willis, C., 1995 FORM FOLLOWS FINANCE: SKYSCRAPERS AND SKYLINES IN NEW YORK AND CHICAGO, Princeton Architectural Press, New York.