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PaperclipPerfector  7mo ago (text post)   2697 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for April 14, 2024

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https://www.wsj.com/us-news/oklahoma-skyscraper-americas-tallest-eaae69d2

OKLAHOMA CITY—Scot Matteson’s team came before this city’s planning commission last week seeking to tweak a development he plans to build in a parking lot hard up against a railroad track and wrapped around two sides of a U-Haul storage facility.

Instead of capping the buildings at the Boardwalk at Bricktown at 345 feet, he’s now thinking one should top out at 1,907—more than twice the height of the tallest building in town, and the biggest in the U.S.

Take a look at this graphic comparing the two tallest buildings for other cities:

https://s.wsj.net/public/resources/images/7a9acbd4-04f0-4a22-b15b-974c516f33c7-OKTALL-_700px.jpg

It seems a bit stupid for the official heights to include the spire. There is obviously a vast difference between another 10 livable stories vs. 120 ft of a metal pole. Surely there is economic value in claiming the title of tallest in city/state/country, so why isn't there a race to the bottom top whereby the moment one dev adds a large pole, another raises the existing pole by another 10 ft at a trivial cost? I guess local zoning could hamper this slightly?

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