We’re finally convinced that the One World Center antenna is going to be deemed a spire.
Yesterday, we got a peek at the faceted, rocket-like crown of the 408 foot-long “antenna” structure that looks like it will take off for another planet.
While this roughly 100 foot section will soon leave terra firma on a crane ride to its 1,700 foot-high perch on top of other “antenna” pieces, the capsule will only appear to touch the stars.
Inside the shiny skin, workers are wiring up hundreds of individual LED lights, whose beams will comprise an architectural beacon flooding the tri-state area via a spinning mirror. An FAA beacon will also wink on the top.
A short lightning rod will top off the tower at 1,795.4 feet above the north lobby, and all will be lit at night by a colorful array of LED lights.
With a pinnacle worthy of Major Tom and a long, curvy perch that can been identified from the Tappan Zee Bridge, we have no doubt now that One WTC will get its height certified all the way to the 1,776-foot top.
With a half-moon poised over the building yesterday morning, the Port Authority owners brought its board; partner-developer Douglas Durst; and its new One World Observatory partners, Legends Hospitality, to the unfinished 100th floor for an introduction to the upcoming one-hour visitor “experience” that they subtitle “See Forever.”
Legends, which is owned by the Yankees and the Dallas Cowboys, also runs the food services and merchandising at those two stadiums. Yankees owner Hank Steinbrenner and the Cowboys’ Jerry Jones braved the cold for the announcement, along with the rest of the shivering guests, as some of the windows are not yet installed.
Legends CEO David Checketts described the “experience” that will have tourists go through a security checkpoint before trekking through winding halls.
Video footage of interviews with construction workers and area history will be projected on walls, some of which will look like mountain glaciers.
The 60-second elevator ride will have simulated view walls before stopping on the 102nd floor. Then a theatrical film with more history takes over, until a curtain majestically rises on the actual sweeping views.
Tourists will be free to wander down to 101, where they can buy food, and to 100 and its dramatic, double-height window walls, where souvenirs will also be available before a simulated outdoor SkyPod elevator lowers them back to reality.
When it opens in 2015, we could envision the cross-marketing mavens adding a Yankee ticket booth or creating a two-fer ticket for both baseball and ballpark views, and, of course, have some Ball Park hot dogs available.
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While the ear-popping elevators in One World Trade Center are made by ThyssenKrupp, they owe their business to P.T. Barnum and Elisha Otis, whose company, Otis Elevator, celebrates its 160th anniversary this week.
Folks used to be terrified that elevators would fall, so Barnum arranged an exhibit at the 1854 New York World’s Fair near what is now Bryant Park.
While standing on an elevator platform in a shaft, Otis was hoisted at 12 feet per minute high into the air. At the top, he dramatically cut the rope with a sabre.
But the platform fell just a few inches because he had invented the safety brake, thus winning over the public to the new contraption.
Renovated Otis elevators now bring visitors swiftly to the top of the Empire State Building’s 86th-floor outdoor observatory and its 101st-story indoor viewing area, which in two years will be duking it out for the big observatory bucks with its rival indoor experience.
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Century Management leased an 11,373 square-foot pre-built on a portion of the 15th floor of 440 Ninth Ave., where the firm will be moving from 7 Penn Plaza.
Gregg Lorberbaum and Samantha Fishbone of Centric Real Estate Advisors represented Century’s president, Mitchell Barry, who likes the West Side area near the upcoming Manhattan West, Hudson Yards and High Line.
Stephen Schofel, Josh Gosin and Elizabeth Houley of Newmark Grubb Knight Frank represented the Paramount Group building ownership, which had an asking rent of $45 per foot.
Paramount was represented in-house by Heather Kahn.