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The Downside to Life in a Supertall Tower: Leaks, Creaks, Breaks

nytimes.com

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Re: The Downside to Life in a Supertall Tower: Leaks, Creaks, Breaks

#41

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

choeger wrote: post #40

> Initial findings showed that 73 percent of mechanical, electrical and plumbing components observed failed to conform with the developers’ drawings How is that even legal? Let alone technically possible? How does construction of these monsters work? "Yo, Bert, I need some 5x5 high-elastic steel framing for the 72th floor!" "Sorry man, we ran out of that when we 'redesigned' the elevator shaft, how about you take thi…

It's going to get even better when the concrete starts spalling off in 40 years of swaying in the wind.

Re: The Downside to Life in a Supertall Tower: Leaks, Creaks, Breaks

#43

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

nefitty wrote: post #10
xyst wrote: post #6

for once, a subsection of rich people get a taste of what most regular people go through on a daily basis just goes to show that this project might have spent more money on marketing and advertising rather than on their engineering and architect departments.

I get the schadenfreude. I used to dismiss the suffering of people who were “beyond” the survival levels of Maslow’s hierarchy. This changed for me when I read that Peter Singer himself focuses on influencing survival-level needs for those in poverty because they are more immediate and are more quantifiable. He said something like, “Well-off people suffer, of course, but those types of suffering are more difficult to…

Having to take the freight elevator to your unfinished $20M apartment isn't suffering. These are spoiled brats grown up.

Re: The Downside to Life in a Supertall Tower: Leaks, Creaks, Breaks

#45

Post by Tade0 »

choeger wrote: post #40

> Initial findings showed that 73 percent of mechanical, electrical and plumbing components observed failed to conform with the developers’ drawings How is that even legal? Let alone technically possible? How does construction of these monsters work? "Yo, Bert, I need some 5x5 high-elastic steel framing for the 72th floor!" "Sorry man, we ran out of that when we 'redesigned' the elevator shaft, how about you take thi…

A friend of mine used to design electrical components for highways.

The workers would almost always try to assemble the devices as fast as possible, cutting corners here and there.

Re: The Downside to Life in a Supertall Tower: Leaks, Creaks, Breaks

#46

Post by GeorgeRichard »

chuckSu wrote: post #37
RodgerTheGreat wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can make a living in organized crime. You can make a living polluting the environment. You can make a living defending corruption, helping the rich grow richer and the poor grow poorer. The problems of the wealthy are as the problems of a tick sucking the lifeblood from a host. Rest assured that extending them empathy and compassion will be a strictly one-sided arrangement when push comes to shove.

Making a living off “rich people problems” has nothing to do with empathy. If their problems put food on my table you best believe I’m going to cater to their bullshit. If it makes me rich even better

Big parasites have little parasites.

Re: The Downside to Life in a Supertall Tower: Leaks, Creaks, Breaks

#47

Post by Erlich_Bachman »

S53Vflnr4n wrote: post #24
cm2187 wrote: post #8

Noise is what turns me off from high rise residential buildings. When you watch the construction, many don’t event have concrete walls between apartments on the same floor, and I am ready to guess the concrete floors are as thin as required to keep the weight of the structure down. Add to that all-glass external walls, and I only heard stories from friends who live there that you hear everything your neighbours do, p…

Call me crazy but when I rent a condo, I try google street maps and go back in history and if I am lucky I get to see the construction phase. That will give an idea about how thick the concrete and the overall structure is. Another way is to look at the balconies. The floor will be as thick as balconies. The walls are a hit or miss. But if you knock on them and press your ears you can get some idea. Apartments near t…

I feel like this is why we're on HN for :P

Where do you find the button for viewing the history of street view? Is it on the normal street view interface, or do you have to use an additional service/hackery?

Re: The Downside to Life in a Supertall Tower: Leaks, Creaks, Breaks

#48

Post by londons_explore »

S53Vflnr4n wrote: post #28
ilkkao wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in Europe and decided to buy an apartment from a building that has been constructed in 1936. Brick walls are about 2ft thick, no issues with the neighbor noise. Still happy with my choice. I think it's the same everywhere. Construction companies optimize everything to make more profit. Hundred years ago, at least here, apartment buildings were constructed mainly by people that had become wealthy. They directly…

I completely agree. The very old buildings in Montreal are soundproof. But the new “optimized” condos coming up have thin concrete floors(the bare minimum code) and the common walls are also soundproofed to the bare minimum code I think STC 50 if I remember.

Concrete floors with multiple thin layers of foam embedded in the concrete end up stronger and lighter than concrete without foam, and are way better at sound insulation. The downside is it's logistically harder to arrange everything in the mould.

When someone figures out a process to do it without so much labor, it'll become standard practice, because it'll save concrete and weight.

Re: The Downside to Life in a Supertall Tower: Leaks, Creaks, Breaks

#49

Post by quicklime »

justinclift wrote: post #29
cm2187 wrote: post #8

Noise is what turns me off from high rise residential buildings. When you watch the construction, many don’t event have concrete walls between apartments on the same floor, and I am ready to guess the concrete floors are as thin as required to keep the weight of the structure down. Add to that all-glass external walls, and I only heard stories from friends who live there that you hear everything your neighbours do, p…

Maybe it's a case of different construction standards in different countries? In Australia, I used to have an apartment in Eureka Tower: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eureka_Tower The windows there were double glazed (good for heat and noise insulation), and I guess the walls were fairly thick as noise from neighbours was never a problem. The only significant problem, and specific to that building, was the designers…

I don't think it's purely a location-based thing. Not that long ago, Australia 108 became Melbourne's tallest building after surpassing the Eureka Tower in height. The residents there complained of walls that creak and crack like what you'd hear in a ship (which the 432 Park residents are also complaining about).

https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/residents-of-mel...

https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/incorrect-constr...

Re: The Downside to Life in a Supertall Tower: Leaks, Creaks, Breaks

#50

Post by uxhacker »

choeger wrote: post #40

> Initial findings showed that 73 percent of mechanical, electrical and plumbing components observed failed to conform with the developers’ drawings How is that even legal? Let alone technically possible? How does construction of these monsters work? "Yo, Bert, I need some 5x5 high-elastic steel framing for the 72th floor!" "Sorry man, we ran out of that when we 'redesigned' the elevator shaft, how about you take thi…

I am doing a restoration of an old palace in Poland, the biggest issue is often the contractors do not understand the architect’s drawings.

The drawings are more for the regulators such as building control than actually for the people working on site.

Talking to the constructors it is normal for architects to specify the impossible, leaving it to the constructor to actually make it up on the job.

Somebody said to me that over 30% of construction costs is waste.

It looks like there is an opportunity to implement lean methods in construction. And weirdly implement Alexander’s ideas patterns and anti patterns.

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