Quote:
Originally Posted by Barrelfish
Part of it is the difference in land values, which pressure NYC buildings to go taller, all else equal. For example, one of those 1000+ towers in NYC is 111w57, which at a height of 1428 ft will have ~316000 square feet of space. Wolf Point East, which will be less than half as tall at 629 ft, will have almost exactly twice the square footage (628500). Vista is ~1200 feet tall, and has almost 5x the square footage of 111w57.
Building a supertall, superskinny tower like 111w57 is a really expensive way to get revenue-generating square footage. If you aren't space constrained like NYC, it makes a lot more financial sense to build less tall but on a larger lot. Of course I'm cherry picking a bit, but I think it's a good illustration. It's not that Chicago isn't having a building boom, it's that our building boom isn't as squeezed into narrow needle towers. |
Double-check some of that data. I think WPE is somewhere between 900,000 and 1 mil sq ft.....I’ve seen height figures that are a bit higher as well...
Not that this impacts your point, obviously....
In addition to the vast difference in underlying economics, a lot of the financing behind the construction of those types of condo units in NY were essentially predicated on a continual pipeline of foreign buyers (many with questionable asset sources, to put it courteously) paying ever-higher prices....there’s a reality check incoming in that part of the market....