Revealed: San Antonio true building heights?

[Boquillas]

Since I've been doing my sketchup models using textures from aerial photos, I've noticed quite a few discrepancies with SA building heights as listed here and on Emporis.

Using the concrete building widths from Google Earth screencaps, I'm applying perspective-corrected textures to see what heights buildings reached at certain widths. I also used shadow lengths on objects of a known height and distance to extrapolate heights. Some buildings actually appear to be higher than listed-- the Municipal Building, listed at 136 feet, seems to be about 190 ft. The Nix, which KevinFromTexas has long suspected is shorter than 375', is really 307' feet tall! Yup. I've checked and double checked, but I'm sure this is the case. More to come as I model more buildings. I'm going to try the Marriott Rivercenter sometime this week.

[KevinFromTexas]

I've also had doubts about that Municipal Building height for a long time. 136 feet seems too short. The building always stands out to me whenever I'm in downtown. And no doubt about the Nix height being wrong.

oldmanshirt had posted some pictures that were taken from the 20th floor of the Vidorra tower. The Nix is clearly shorter than the Bank of America Plaza. It even appears to be shorter than the Crowne Plaza Hotel which is behind it and still appears taller. Bank of America Plaza is supposed to be 387 feet tall, while the Crowne Plaza Hotel is supposed to be 325 feet tall.


The rest of them are here, in case you missed them:
http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...=77107&page=59

[KevinFromTexas]

I also remember someone had posted a drawing showing some buildings in downtown. It wasn't anything too detailed, just some outlines of the buildings with a few heights listed. I forget which project it was for, but it was using the heights to show how tall the proposed building would be compared to the existing ones. It actually showed the Nix Professional Hospital at 307 feet. I've actually wondered if that 375 foot height is including the flagpole.

[ydoc14]

I bet it is for the flagpole. As for the MR, I really think the 441' figure is to the spires, and 546' is obviously bogus. I calculated the height one time to be 415' to the pyramids, and something like 380-390' for the roof, so it'll be interesting to see what you come up w/.

What about the Weston & BOAP, what'd you come up w/ for those?

[oldmanshirt]

Didn't somebody figure out that the height for several buildings had been embellished by riverwalk frontage being included? Seems like you could add 20-40 feet that way.

[sakyle04]

Originally Posted by oldmanshirt

Didn't somebody figure out that the height for several buildings had been embellished by riverwalk frontage being included? Seems like you could add 20-40 feet that way.

exactly what i was thinking...

i think it would be fair to give them that height.

also, i am thinking that the nix includes the flagpole. that makes sense.

[Boquillas]

Originally Posted by ydoc14

I bet it is for the flagpole. As for the MR, I really think the 441' figure is to the spires, and 546' is obviously bogus. I calculated the height one time to be 415' to the pyramids, and something like 380-390' for the roof, so it'll be interesting to see what you come up w/.

What about the Weston & BOAP, what'd you come up w/ for those?

Weston and BOAP seem about right--444' and 375'-- but because they're so tall, there are no taller buildings nearby to use for a frame of reference. However, they are recent buildings (relatively speaking) so the documentation available is generally more reliable. I'm beginning to think MR is in the BOAP height range, too, 380'-395'. Definitely shorter than WC.

The ones I'm most interested in are the less-noticed buildings in the 200'-300' "no man's land" -- Riverview Towers West, the Majestic Plaza Building, Drury, Frost Bank Tower, etc. Looking from the TOA, the Municipal Plaza building is almost 2/3 the height of the FBT, yet one is listed at 136' and the other 299'. So either the FBT is only about 210' (not likely) or the MPB is 190'.

[KevinFromTexas]

Using the photo that oldmanshirt posted again.

I agree that Marriott Rivercenter is most likely not 546 feet tall. I even have doubts about the 441 foot height. If I had to guess, based on estimating the Marriott's height against the Hyatt's, I'd say it's about 480 feet to the spires. The roof height seems to be 400 to 410 feet. Remember that in the blueprints for the Hyatt, that I measured the mechanical penthouse to be about 75 feet tall. The Marriott in this picture seems to be a little bit lower than the top of the penthouse of Hyatt.


As for measuring the height of buildings from riverwalk level, I'm not crazy about that idea. Is a building that stands along the river taller/higher than one that doesn't just because it goes down to the river level? We already have enough questions and doubts about the building heights without creating another equation.

[ydoc14]

Originally Posted by KevinFromTexas

Using the photo that oldmanshirt posted again.

I agree that Marriott Rivercenter is most likely not 546 feet tall. I even have doubts about the 441 foot height. If I had to guess, based on estimating the Marriott's height against the Hyatt's, I'd say it's about 480 feet to the spires. The roof height seems to be 400 to 410 feet. Remember that in the blueprints for the Hyatt, that I measured the mechanical penthouse to be about 75 feet tall. The Marriott in this picture seems to be a little bit lower than the top of the penthouse of Hyatt.


As for measuring the height of buildings from riverwalk level, I'm not crazy about that idea. Is a building that stands along the river taller/higher than one that doesn't just because it goes down to the river level? We already have enough questions and doubts about the building heights without creating another equation.

That is actually not a good picture to compare the two with because notice how one spire on the MR is higher than the other one?? There's distortion, the height increases on anything as you move left to right on the picture. Therefore if you drew a line from spire to spire, and continued the line at the same angle over to the GH then you might could accurately compare based on this picture. The best way is to either be between both buildings, or, view the skyline from a distance where the buildings line up on a linear plane. When you do that, the penthouse on the GH is slightly higher than the pyramids on the Marriott.

[KevinFromTexas]

Originally Posted by Boquillas

The ones I'm most interested in are the less-noticed buildings in the 200'-300' "no man's land" -- Riverview Towers West, the Majestic Plaza Building, Drury, Frost Bank Tower, etc. Looking from the TOA, the Municipal Plaza building is almost 2/3 the height of the FBT, yet one is listed at 136' and the other 299'. So either the FBT is only about 210' (not likely) or the MPB is 190'.

Have you checked Emporis? A few of these are listed there.

The Majestic Plaza. Are you talking about the Majestic Building at 214-226 East Houston Street? That one is 187 feet to the top of the decorative crown and 155 feet to the roof.

As for the Frost Bank Tower and Riverview Tower West. I'm thinking the Frost Bank Tower is probably around 290 feet. Compare it to the Drury and Milam. It's close to their heights which are 278 and 280 respectively. The Riverview Tower is slightly shorter than the Drury, and a good bit shorter than the Frost Bank Tower. I'd say it's probably around 260 feet tall. Also compare it to the Holiday Inn which is supposed to be 228 feet.

[John R]

For the older, historic skyscrapers, have you checked the Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps? I have found them to be the most accurate for the older buildings. You can also get heights for demolished buildings there. Most main public libraries have at least one copy of the books of maps. You might check the San Antonio Public Library in downtown.

The Fort Worth Public Library has all of Texas in its online catalog and I have found information on buildings in other cities there. I would do the research for you as a favor, but my library card just expired and I have to go down to the library to renew.

[KevinFromTexas]

A lot of the heights for the older buildings at Emporis already have their heights listed from that source. For any others that were possibly missed, I'm not sure. How exactly do you go about finding those maps?

If you could do the research like you said, that would be very helpful. I'd like to look into this for Austin too. There are still some buildings I haven't been able to gather info on, and most of their building managers either seem to be unwilling to give it out, or don't have it.

The same is true for San Antonio, where I have asked for heights through countless emails. I've just about given up.

[ydoc14]

Here's a very nice picture, taken by Mopacs, that I used to compare the MR and GH.

[KevinFromTexas]

The Marriott's still the tallest building if you count the spires. Since they're part of the design, the Marriott would still be taller. I'd say the spires probably go up for another 50 feet or so. So the building is probably around ~470 feet tall with them.

[arturo_pro]

San antonio needs more skyscrapres!!

[STLtoSA]

I have access to Pictommetry taken in Dec '08, so if anyone has any questions about building heights, let me know.

[STLtoSA]

Here are some rough figures of the buildings on Emporis w/o heights.





Post Edit: Sorry, I will come up with something that can be read.

[ydoc14]

here's the latest estimates using bing's bird's eye view
the grand hyatt measurement (in cm) is what the others are based off of

formula: [(building height in cm) x (424)] / 8.76

Marriott Rivercenter
roof: [(6.77) x (424)] / 8.76 = 328'
pyramids: [(8.52) x (424)] / 8.76 = 412'
spires: [(9.26) x (424)] / 8.76 = 448'



Tower of the Americas
roof: [(12.90) x (424)] / 8.76 = 624'



Weston Centre
top of "box": [(9.22) x (424)] / 8.76 = 446'



Tower Life
top of structure/bottom of flagpole: [(7.86) x (424)] / 8.76 = 380'

Drury Plaza
roof: [(5.84) x (424)] / 8.76 = 283'
top of sign: [(6.3) x (424)] / 8.76 = 305'



Bank of America Plaza
roof: [(7.73) x (424)] / 8.76 = 374'

[KevinFromTexas]

Hmm, I had always thought the roof of Marriott was higher than 328 feet. Although, you're 328 foot number is for the setback where the sign is. That might be right. That building seems tall, though.

Your TOA height seems pretty much spot on. The roof height we've always heard for it is 622 feet.

The Weston Centre seems taller than that to me. I don't know. It always looks taller than anything other building in downtown.

380 for Tower Life is pretty close.

Your Drury Plaza height is pretty much right. I've always heard 280 feet for it to the roof, and 341 feet to the top of the antenna/mast. If your number is right, and you figure the top of the sign is 25 feet higher than the roof, the mast seems a little more than 25 feet higher than the top of the sign since it's greater than the distance from the roof and top of the sign.

I'm not sure about the Bank of America height. It seems fairly tall. The number I've always heard is 387 feet.

One building I'm convinced we've been wrong on is the Nix Hospital. The height I've always heard is 375 feet, and there is no way it's almost as tall as the Bank of America Plaza. I've seen level photos from the Tower Life Building showing both buildings, and the Bank of America Plaza is clearly taller. I'm thinking the 375 foot height is for the flagpole, and that the actual rooftop height is somewhere around 325 feet or so. Which brings me back to the Marriott. I've always thought the rooftop height for it, even at that setback at the sign, is higher than 328 feet. Even the height for the Crown Plaza Hotel that I found is 325 feet.

I don't know. It's so hard to judge all the building heights when you have doubts about so many of them. I usually rely on neighboring buildings with reliable heights (from blueprints or similarly reliable sources), to estimate the height. In the past, I've been able to estimate heights to within 5 feet just by eye. It's also difficult for San Antonio because many of the tallest buildings are spread out across downtown, and there are really few good places to view the skyline from afar so that you can get a good view of how buildings compare height-wise on the skyline.

[JACKinBeantown]

Can someone get a skyline shot from the Trinity University tower? Don't know if you can even go up there but it would be a good vantage point. Or maybe a condo building in the Alamo Heights area.