Originally Posted by KevinFromTexas
The heights in the World Almanac actually come from Emporis.com, which are added by myself, (I'm an editor for the site). If you look at the credits for the building heights on the last page of the building height listing, you'll see the name Marshall Gerometta. He's a senior editor at Emporis and one of the die hard building height collecting nerds. Years ago the World Almanac editors called Marshall to get him to update their lists for US cities. They had always listed skyscrapers for their almanac, but didn't really have a dedicated person to keep track of the progress on skyscrapers with their construction and development. Marshall of course was very dedicated, he's been collecting building heights for about 35 years. He's been keeping his own list for about that long, and used to have a website. Since becoming a senior editor at Emporis however, he scrapped his website, but still keeps his own list on an MS Excel file, as well as being the main "height hound" at Emporis. In 2002 he came down to Austin and I met up with him and we walked around downtown for a bit and even got a few building heights.
That list JGFrisco posted is right, for the most part, but I do see a few heights that need to be updated. That info must have been gathered before I updated the heights. For instance, the height listed for Altavida. We had originally heard 416 feet, at least that's what a man at the construction site told me a year ago. But as it turns out from the blueprints, the height is actually 412 feet tall. 360 Condos should be 563 feet, not 562 feet. Frost Bank Tower does NOT have 42 floors. Spring is supposed to be 434 feet apparently, not 432 feet. 21C should be listed as 580 feet. The 550 foot height was what was originally listed.
Here is how the list should look: * indicates it's under construction. The Almanac does not list buildings that are merely proposed or even approved. They either have to be completed, or officially under construction.
*The Austonian - 683 feet - 56 floors - 2010
*360 Condominiums - 563 feet - 44 floors - 2008
Frost Bank Tower - 515 feet - 33 floors - 2004
*Spring - 434 feet - 42 floors - 2010
*W Austin Hotel & Residences - 433 feet - 35 floors - 2009
*Altavida - 412 feet - 37 floors - 2009
The Almanac's list has gotten longer and longer through the years of course as cities grow. I remember seeing height lists in there that went down to 300 feet, then 350 feet. Now though they only go down to 400 feet. This of course is because cities are growing, more buildings are being built and it makes the list so long that they don't have enough room in the book.
It's funny to look at Austin through the years on their list. Back in the early 90s they had only a few buildings listed, mostly this was because they didn't have heights for everything, and they just didn't have someone on their staff that was familiar enough with every American city to list everything. To be fair, it's a huge task. One American Center, One Congress Plaza, Bank of America Center, Chase Bank Center, the Capitol and the UT Tower were listed, even though there were taller buildings that should have also been included. Then they changed the cut off point to 350 feet, so Austin only had 2 on the list, One American Center (395 feet 32 floors), and One Congress Plaza (391 feet 30 floors). It should have been three, because the Dobie Center is 367 feet tall with 29 floors. Then around 2000, they made the cutoff point 400 feet. At that point Austin didn't have anything over 400 feet tall. It wasn't until the 2002 Almanac was published that Austin was back on the list again with the Frost Bank Tower. The city was listed on the last pages of the height list in an area with other cities that had fewer than 2 buildings over 400 feet.
Now though with several 400 footers on the way and at least two 500 footers and a 600 footer, Austin will likely have a place on the list for quite sometime.
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