Why doesn't London have many skyscrapers?

[aahala]

Here’s my guess. London and its people’s view of it were well formed before the introduction of passanger elevators. An elevator link:

http://www.ideafinder.com/history/inventions/story049.htm

[owlstretchingtime]

@gazpacho

I looked at that on the web. It is a strange looking building isn’t it.

It’s pretty impressive inside too.

[lieu]

This is the case for San Antonio in that part of the city behind the Alamo. They’ll allow tall buildings elsewhere, just not where they’d be in a photograph taken of the Alamo’s front facade.

[suranyi]

I don’t see what’s so surprising about London. Hardly any of the major old European cities have high office buildings in the center of town. In Paris, Brussels, Rome, etc. the skyscrapers, if there are any, are on the edge of the city.

Ed

[ccwaterback]

Uh oh, there goes the neighborhood.

http://www.crossriverpartnership.org/page.asp?id=1329

John Prescott, the Deputy Prime Minister, approved the Shard of Glass development scheme following an earlier public enquiry. The proposed development, located at Tooley Street, London, SE1, is proposed for a site immediately adjacent to London Bridge Station.

The proposed scheme would comprise new retail, office, hotel and residential accommodation, and amount to over 60,000 sq m. If built, the scheme at 66 stories, would be Europe’s highest building.

The scheme was designed by Renzo Piano, and the developer is Sellar Property / CLS Holdings.

[scm1001]

@Colophon

Better that than New Zealand House, say (Note to Kiwis: you have one of the most beautiful countries in the world, so why in God’s name did you visit this monstrosity on central London?).

to make you want to leave london and visit us?

[plnnr]

@Spectre of Pithecanthropus

It’s cheaper in the short run to expand horizontally, but in the long run it’s more expensive in terms of fuel consumption, traffic, and commuting time.

It isn’t even cheaper in the short run. It is much cheaper to build vertically, within a smaller footprint, than it is to build horizontally. You get much more square footage for a smaller and smaller increase in per square foot costs when you build vertically. If you build vertically, your costs are all going into the physical building, not excavating, site engineering, grading, and land acquisition.

[GorillaMan]

@scm1001

to make you want to leave london and visit us?

Or maybe to encourage all the Kiwis to go home?

[GorillaMan]

@plnnr

It isn’t even cheaper in the short run. It is much cheaper to build vertically, within a smaller footprint, than it is to build horizontally. You get much more square footage for a smaller and smaller increase in per square foot costs when you build vertically. If you build vertically, your costs are all going into the physical building, not excavating, site engineering, grading, and land acquisition.

This is all late-19th-century-onwards logic. This map rather neatly shows the mid-1800s situation, with a built-up area roughly in the region of the Circle Line. The precedent for outward horizontal spread was clearly set, and with so much open land plus the eruption of new railways all over the place, building upwards would have been a strange option.

[spingears]

@Gyrate

Maybe London doesn’t have WTC-style towers but have you looked at the Docklands lately? Tall buildings are sprouting like weeds. And then there’s the f***ing Gherkin (which, if you haven’t guessed, I hate). London is moving up.

Now that’s quite a symbol! Looks like a 1935-1945 sci-fi rocket ship too.
Look for “Gherkin Building”

[Futile_Gesture]

@Gyrate

And then there’s the f***ing Gherkin (which, if you haven’t guessed, I hate).

Umm, having viewed the pictures all I can say is… where do you insert the batteries?

[Crusoe]

The new Greater London Assembly City Hall building is also fairly striking, if not a skyscraper.

[clairobscur]

How many western european cities have a significant number of skycrappers build in the dowtown, anyway?

[clairobscur]

How many western european cities have a significant number of skycrappers build in the dowtown, anyway?
Who would want a skycrapper in plain view of a 500 years old castle?

[GorillaMan]

@Crusoe

The new Greater London Assembly City Hall building is also fairly striking, if not a skyscraper.

Well, the ‘eyecatching Norman Foster building’ stakes is one of the few that [Ipswich has a remote chance of acceptance…

[Ignatz]

@Gyrate

That’s the one. Also known as the Swiss Re Tower, or 30 St Mary Axe.

/hijack to your response/ Being a streetnamebuff, can you or another (?) Brit (Gorilla Man?) please explain the history of the name, St. Mary AXE, assuming that’s the street name.

[Bambi_Hassenpfeffer]

@adam yax

Here are some pictures the building. Most developers try and stay away from round buildings.

We have one. We call it the Double-A.

@Colophon

Another factor not mentioned there, but which I imagine has an impact on planning decisions, is the fact the central London still largely has its medieval street pattern of narrow winding lanes and alleys, not the wide straight streets of most American cities. Fitting skyscrapers in between these lanes would cause unacceptable overshadowing - imagine “canyons” as deep as those in Manhattan, but with a street only 20 or 30 feet wide at the bottom.

There are several streets within Manhattan that are nearly that narrow, and the skyscrapers along them can be kind of oppressive. I’m thinking of Beaver St and environs for those of you who know the area.

[Walloon]

David Littlejohn, “Unique Building Design Is More Vlasic Than Classic”, The Wall Street Journal:

The short London street on which it sits was named for a long-lost church that supposedly contained the very ax by which thousands of fifth-century virgins were slaughtered by Attila and his Huns.

The Lives of Ss. Edmund and Fremund:

The curious name of the church derived from its possession of an axe said to be one of the three with which St. Ursula and the eleven thousand virgins were beheaded. Ursula, the daughter of a king of England, was travelling on the lower Rhine with 11,000 handmaidens, when they met Attila the Hun, who slaughtered them all with three axes (The London Encyclopedia, p. 761).

[Crandolph]

@Eve

I’ll never forgive Philadelphia for dropping the “no building taller than City Hall” rule and putting up a bunch of crappy skyscrapers, ruining the skyline.

They waited till I left, as they knew I would never have put up with that. “OK, she’s moved to Baltimore—start your engines!”

There wasn’t any actual rule or law by the by… it was an old fashioned “gentlemen’s agreement” that went out the window with (primarily) developer Willard Rouse’s influence in the mid-80s. We have a number of non-descript skyscrapers being built even today with the real estate boom, now that all the people who bankrupted the city by fleeing to the suburbs have decided that it’s cool to move back in… and bring the suburban chain stores in with/for them. Ick…

[gouda]

Frankfurt is the only major western european city I can think of which has a bunch of tall buildings in the city centre.

I remember seeing the Gherkin being constructed about 3 years ago… I couldn’t figure out what it was supposed to be - all that came to mind was the Reichstag in Berlin, which has a sort of glass dome from where you can look into the building.