CHICAGO | Salesforce Tower | 850 FT | 60 FLOORS
 

https://i.imgur.com/OJ15bqF.jpg?1

https://i.imgur.com/YsYELO4.jpg?1

Fuck yeah!!!! :cheers:

What a design too, just imagine looking up the river.

Now that is a Chicago style supertall! Love the nod to art deco/NBC tower/cleanness/simplicity. This is PoMo done right! Take notes RAMSA, o' begetter of turds and vaulted whorehouses.

Also, the description of the project now includes hotel in the plan as Sam and others have speculated. Hopefully this means the next tower will start soon! Hope it's the tallest that starts next as a hotel and condo building.

The south (middle tower) tower will start next as they're moving west to east. There will be community meetings before this starts and the project will have to go back before the plan commission as per the alderman's commentary.

I love both the South and West revised designs.

Wolf Point West already looks very tall from the river. These are going to look world class. With 150 Riverside, 444 West Lake, and Wanda Vista, and these towers, Chicago's river canyon is going to be incredible. Just think about how different it will be than 15 years ago?

Ho.ly. Crap. This is great! Love the redesign.

*Please be over 1,200'. Please be over 1,200'.*

Looks to be hovering around 1200 feet.

Where's the guy who counts pixels.

Hahahahaha! I did count about 71-72 floors (for the South tower), but not sure how much of it at the top of parapet or full-thru floor.

Has kind of a nod to Art Deco. Love it.

The current tower now looks a bit out of place from the current proposal

Blown up for those who like to count/speculate these sorts of things.

http://i.imgur.com/9UZoX1t.jpg

wow...actually did anyone else notice that the floors in the South Tower have significantly higher ceilings than the west tower? Makes me think the South tower will actually have office space vs the west tower...I'm all for more office space :tup:

Not to rain on the parade here but I think the floor height looking larger in the south tower and at least some of its height is due to the perspective. Remember the south tower is closer than the other two towers in this render and as a result looks bigger so comparisons might be off quite a bit.

Yeah, but we're still looking at 1,100 feet to top of spire at the very least.

Not yet, at least in my opinion. We don't have any other details other than a rendering.

A side-by-side for your scrutiny.

http://images.photo1.walgreens.com/2...84286324nu0mrjhttp://images.photo1.walgreens.com/2...%3B78324nu0mrj


Remember that the west tower was originally going to be 525', but it ended up being 493'. All they have to do is shift around mass and other variables. Also, from recollection, they're not even using all the density they actually could.

Hell yea!

Looks 1000+ to the roof alone. I always had faith they'd pull through with a supertall :)

I think the previous design had a lot more cohesiveness and looked very graceful over the river. This new render/proposal has a bit of in your face magnificence, begging viewers to look at it rather than 150 or 444. And really the lack of cohesiveness doesn't matter that much, because in terms of the skyline, the South and East towers will stand out a lot more and be much more recognizable. The East tower's design is now vastly superior to the blob it was before. It also looks like they've added green space in front of it; I'm not sure what spurred that.

I'm also confused as to why the glass appears to different than the West, perhaps they just wanted to copy+paste? Maybe it's just the shadows/reflections

A quick overlay... not 100% accurate, but it gets it close enough.

http://i.imgur.com/4IZFKkG.jpg

Agreed.

Though I think the new East Tower is a sizable improvement I actually think the new South Tower loses some of its more refinded subtleties. It looks 1980s to me. Without much in the way in the way of significant added height. Plus I find spires to be often overused (especially in NYC over the last decade) and this tower is a case in point.

South tower kind of reminds me of the new Comcast Center

http://photos.visitphilly.com/new-co...kyline-830.jpg

Nice! But yea the new rendering is a little bigger so the overlap slightly under exaggerates the height change, which is a good thing. It will really be over 1000 to the roof instead of ~975' which you get when you overlap them.

I'm not sure if I explained that correctly but hopefully someone understands me. ;)

Agreed, like a cross between that and the Nordstrom tower. I think this design would be cooler with more height and bulk. I'm not complaing though. :)

My guess the community meeting would be soon.:shrug:

i think this is a great bulkiness. all of the Chicago supertalls are very bulky and thick, its about time we got a good skinny supertall.

I did a quick scaling of the new image to match the proportions of the foreground elements, match the river edge, match the Kinzie Street bridge, and match Merchandise Mart... so unless they manipulated the perspective of only the top half of the render, it should be fairly accurate.

The sky might be throwing people off, since they used the exact same background image (a northern sky sunset? come on), but they placed it a touch higher in the new image to add a touch more contrast.

As it should; it's Wolf Point! This new proposal is world class. The spire is a nice touch. The proportions seem inspired by 30 Rock. Gorgeous. Imagine a tourist cruising up the River from Union Station: Sears > 150 > This > 333 N LaSalle > Trump > the four beauties at MiWack > Wanda Vista. Wow.

Wow......

That's unreal...

I think the setbacks need a bit of work. Multiple setbacks can create a nice visual rhythm and progression like on 30 rock. But the setbacks on the south tower particularly the second pair of setbacks don't seem to accomplish that. From the render it doesn't seem that they distinguish themselves enough from the central portion of the tower or align themselves well between the first setback and the roof. It reads more like the shoulders of 311 S. wacker than the nicely aligned steps of 30 rock.

The altered plan for WP seems much better to me. More elegant, less blobby south and east towers. The total effect is a unified whole. The west tower no longer looks like an afterthought. And, the new south tower stands like an exclamation point at the end of the river canyon.

We need a rendering showing a view from the east which looks west to get the full effect of the new setbacks.

There will need to be a new, improved traffic study to support the sustainability of the 2 additional towers at WP. It will be interesting to see if the starting point of the projections is after completion of the WP west tower, RiverPoint and 150 Riverside on pedestrian, bicycle and vehicle traffic in the WP extended area.

^Pilton/Jarta, all "traffic studies" are red herrings and I think most of the forumers on this thread realize this (the only ones who might not, probably have a distorted view (oops, excuse the pun :-) ) by living in the immediate neighborhood)... whatever changes to the program and additional highrises that might happen here will have negligible effect on traffic, unless they change both towers to hotels, and even then it would not really be a significant issue...
Orleans/Lake/Wacker/Canal/Kinzie can easily handle all of the traffic... will there be congestion, particularly during rush hours? of course, but that's part of why we all love dense cities and I can't remember when congestion in that part of our city has ever been an issue... (or, really, in any part of our city including Streeterville)

To state what should be obvious: There is no reason at all to think this new design is anything other than a placeholder, just like the previous version..............we don't even know who the architects will be for the S and E towers - it might end up being PCP for one or both, sure, but it could very well be another firm(s) for one or both of them.......

I love the revisions. How is it that developers are able to make such drastic changes just like that, on a project so massive?

So, which building is going to be Chicago's new third tallest, Wanda Vista or Wolf Point South?

The question is somewhat rhetorical.

This horse race is going to be fun.

Easily? Isn't that what the traffic study is supposed to measure? Things like - will there be enough space for people, bikes and vehicles to easily move about? And, if not, what infrastructure improvements need to and/or can be made to allow even greater density now - and into the future?

I was not talking about rush hours. Orleans, Kinzie, Canal, Wacker and Lake are all stressed during rush hours (plural) by people, bikes and vehicles right now.

The new traffic study was a mandatory requirement of the permission granted to build the WP west tower. The ultimate decision is up to the Plan Commission, Reilly, Rahm and the City Council. (One thing seems clear, though. There are those who want to put the dedicated bike lanes on Kinzie in play.)

The new WP plan is architecturally more significant, elegant and appropriate to the WP site, IMO. No comment on my liking the new plan? More density all that matters?

I'm sure that an updated traffic study will be submitted. However, the overall project was approved for 1,000+ parking spaces, which has already been factored into things, so there's that...

Congratulations on liking the plan, I do to.

Okay, the streets are stressed/congested, what about it:shrug:? That's not going to change.

Welcome to a downtown metropolis:tup:

better. pretty building really

I may be in the minority but it looked better before.......

What "infrastructure improvements" might need to be made as a result of another red herring traffic study specifically? With the exception of tinkering with dedicated turn lanes, etc. there is really nothing that could or should be done... our city grid (or grids if you count the layering of Wacker/Carroll, etc.) are more than capable of handling this development and so much more... my post was simply to point out the inherent nimby pandering of all "traffic studies"

A bit of information...

The architects of both the south and east tower is indeed Pelli/Clarke/Pelli

The south PD allows for 950'. However, this usually means to the underside of the top floor and doesn't include fins, blades, or spires. The height to the top of the spire is still TBD. Number of floors is TBD.

The PD for the east tower allows 750', floors TBD.

Timetable for the start of Phase II is still TBD.

I know this isn't much, but it's what i have right now.

I like the old south tower better also...i do like the new east tower better though. I think the real deciding factor for me is when i get to see a view of it from the side.

This would be my favorite spot for an observation deck.

I gotta say, I think the south tower would look better without the spire, supertall status be damned.

As in, they have been awarded a contract to be the design architect of these two towers - or, as in, PCP, the master plan architect of WP, has also produced this new rendering depicting these two towers??

I feel the exact same way. Original south tower superior to this new rendered design, east tower may be a bit better in the new one.......




These folks that get all Aspergers over whether a tower reaches 1,000' or not are really, uh, weird.....

How about an external elevator concept that goes up that center seem of the south face?

For a million reasons, I'm sure that isn't feasible, but I would wait in line to ride it..

If there is nothing that might need to be done, why does the current zoning require a new traffic study before Phase 2 of Wolf Point goes forward? If something needs to be done concerning pedestrian, bike and vehicle traffic and nothing can be done, maybe the current allowed density prohibits safe or reasonable access to WP?

But, I happen to think something can always be done. Bike lanes can be relocated. A subway and pedestrian (and bike?) tunnel can be dug under the Confluence from River Point to Wolf Point. The Kinzie Street upramp to Orleans can be re-opened. Car traffic can be allowed into WP from Kinzie and lower Orleans Street (currently prohibited in the PD zoning). Metra tracks at Canal and/or Clilnton could be lowered to go under one or both. The old RR bridge at Carroll Street can be retrofitted to provide access from Canal or Clinton. Those are just a few options that come to mind.

Why not wait for the new traffic study to be released before maintaining that nothing could or should be done?

because that's how the city that works, "works". it's just how the game is played.

bones must be regularly thrown to the endlessly yapping NIMBY pack to shut them up, however temporarily.

ha! well said, Steely... and Pilton/Jarta, some of your ideas might be reasonable, some are good ideas if we had oh, I don't know, a quadzillion dollars to spend on public transportation needs in the metro area... but none of which are necessary for this project to be successfully built and operated...