forgive me if this has been addressed before, but how do they prevent destabilization the foundations of the surrounding tall buildings? id imagine the downward weight of the immediately adjacent buildings to push out into the void that has been created by the excavation of nordstrom tower.

The weight exerts primarily downward pressure and the buildings don't need anything to prop up these walls to stay intact. Think about the basement or the first floor- there is pretty much nothing to "stabilize" them but everything is generally fine unless the architect and the engineers really screwed up

Deep excavation often only happens in places where the bedrock is close to the surface like in Manhattan. In most of Manhattan the buildings sit directly on solid bedrock so there is no chance the downward weight can displace what is basically solid stone. In places like Chicago where bedrock is deep below the surface they will support the walls with sheet piles when excavating. Also the buildings in those locations rely on large caissons drilled into the bedrock that support the buildings weight.

So why are they drilling caissons at TV instead of excavating the site? Is bedrock too deep at 53rd street?

Upper Midtown has bedrock that is measured in a few feet given how close it is. Its very close to the surface. Actually, if you go to Central Park, you can see exposed bedrock spewing from the ground. Right around the Plaza, theres actually a formation present that people can sit on. While most of Central Park is man made, there are natural elements to it such as the cuttings of schist and a mix of gneiss. You could also tell there was glacial activity in the area (hence the formation of palisades and the region, given the way it looks, and this types of striations and what not in the formations). These cuttings tend to be smooth polished too indicating it. Well, without going too too into it, this bedrock allows for many of Manhattan's skyscrapers.

this tower is everything !~ :worship:

Right, this is true in upper midtown, which doesn't really address the question about TV since it is definitely upper midtown. It's a good question. Downtown of course is a whole different story. While the bedrock isn't as deep as Chicago, the excavation for the foundation of the original World Trade Center towers was 70 feet deep to get to the bedrock. The venerable Woolworth employed caissons since it was built on what at one time was a swamp, making its height in 1913 even more amazing for the time.

I have a pretty cool pic of my (then much younger) daughters scaling the gigantic boulders in Central Park. The rock formations are really quite interesting.

Yes something along those lines. The Bedrock is deeper than they want to excavate. That may not mean that bedrock is at a crazy depth it could just mean that it's deep enough that it's more cost effective to drill caissons than do the amount of excavation needed to get down to bedrock. There's no hard and fast rule on this stuff some sites it could go either way.

Could always be a combo. In SF's financial district, bedrock might be 200-300 ft down, requiring caissons. However, there will always be excavation to a depth of 50-80 ft regardless for mechanical garages, systems, etc. One thing we've seen with several recent towers is the installation of caissons before excavation even starts. Which becomes technical because not only do the caissons have to be 200-300 ft deep and earthquake-engineered, they have to rise up to a depth of 50-80 ft below the surface because excavation has yet to begin. New York, SF, and Boston seem to be the only cities with consistently very deep excavation - I guess in New York's case they may not even care about putting in a garage, it's simply to reach bedrock? Might as well do garage at that point if you're going to dig the hole!

New parking is not allowed in Manhattan without getting a variance from the city. If there is parking in this development, they will have to appeal to the city, and demonstrate a clear need for an exception.

When they dig out these monstrous holes, what do they fill them with? The least they can do is put a mechanical garage in there and make money off of that. Let's face it, if you're spending millions to tens of millions on a condo, you own at least a car. Why park it elsewhere when you can store it in your own building? That's the thought in SF, which is admittedly more car friendly, but still...they have to spend all that money on excavation anyway, and these people are shelling out a fortune to live in these new towers, they have a little bit of a fortune more to own a car and keep it on site for weekend getaways.

You guys are killing me here.

The topic is 217 West 57th Street - aka the Nordstrom Tower. Discuss.



• Video Link

^^ We are just waiting for the official render. I will try to get some new pics this weekend.

Yep ... we want to talk about Nordstrom ... need new news to be able to talk about it.

Looking forward to it. We are getting closer to real action here.

Its a massive site, no wonder its talking so long to prepare. I feel like we've been spoiled after One 57 went up so fast, and 432 Park for that matter. But neither of them had an entire department store to build.

...or you can have a driver, like normal billionaires do.
Who would take a car over the helicopter for a weekend getaway anyway. To get stuck in traffic on the BQE? Ridiculous.

it may have a garage though, 432 Park does for example

Wow! Very nice. Thanks for sharing the video and I really appreciate that. Do you have any new video?

I thought you were allowed 1 space / 20% of residential units in the Manhattan Core, up to a certain maximum number of spaces?

No parking is allowed as of right in Manhattan. You need to get a variance from the city.

Maybe that 20% share is the typically allowed variance standard? I don't know. I would not be surprised if there were some limited parking in this tower, but probably only a few spaces limited to residents, and entered on 58th street, of course.

Also, people are getting confused on the pit for 225 W. 57. It isn't at all typical for NYC, as most NYC towers do not have deep foundations. The pit is deep in this case in part because much of Nordstrom will be below-grade. But if you look at, say, 432 Park, the pit wasn't that deep, at all, probably because the below-grade uses will be more limited.