Talk:Empire State Building

Building ranking lists don't make sense
The entry currently says "seventh-tallest building in New York City, the ninth-tallest completed skyscraper in the United States, the 54th-tallest in the world, and the sixth-tallest freestanding structure in the Americas." There is no way this can be the 6th-tallest freestanding structure in all the Americas if it also only the 7th-tallest in just NY and the ninth-tallest in the US. All skyscrapers are freestanding structures SFAIK. I think this just means that the freestanding structure list has quite a lot of new skyscrapers missing from it. Maybe the best thing to do is just remove that mention, although of course one could spend a lot of time updating and merging the lists so that they actually make sense, then update the entry with the correct ranking. Wookey (talk) 23:33, 14 December 2022 (UTC)
 * I was wondering about this too, but apparently it seems to be correct. The spire is the 6th-tallest in the Americas at 1,454 feet, which would beat even NYC's third-tallest building, 111 West 57th Street. But the roof, which is only 1,250 feet high, is shorter than six other structures in NYC.I do doubt the methodology that's being used here, though, because 1 WTC's spire is being counted in the List of tallest buildings in New York City, but the Empire State Building's spire isn't. As a result, the comparison might be a bit flawed, and I agree that we should probably remove the mention of freestanding structures. – Epicgenius (talk) 23:47, 2 May 2023 (UTC)
 * User:Epicgenius you are confusing pinnacle with architectural height. The architectural height of the ESB is 1,250 ft, and for 1WTC is 1,776 ft. The pinnacle height for the ESB is 1,454 ft, and for 1WTC is 1,792 ft at present. Pinnacle height includes things like antennas that can be swapped out. In fact the ESB's antenna has been swapped out as prior to 1985 it was 1,472 ft to its pinnacle, a value still sometimes erroneously reported in sources. Whereas architectural height includes permanent elements of the skyscraper only. Roof-height was previously often used as a standard in lieu of architectural height to avoid this confusion, however it poses many dilemmas when dealing with structures that do not have flat roofs such as the Burj Khalifa (where do floors end and spires begin?), and so has largely fallen by the wayside as a standard. 71.62.176.24 (talk) 22:58, 9 December 2023 (UTC)
 * I see. In this case, please disregard my previous comment. – Epicgenius (talk) 23:18, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

Competing Claims in Intro
The competing claims in the intro that the empire state building is the 6th-tallest freestanding structure in the western hemisphere, but also the 7th-tallest building in new york city is logically inconsistent. The other buildings in New York City alone are themselves also freestanding structures in the western hemisphere, right? 68.197.183.151 (talk) 02:12, 28 January 2024 (UTC)


 * It depends on whether architectural or pinnacle height is used. For skyscrapers usually architectural height is used since antennas can be and sometimes are swapped out, so pinnacle height is not fixed. For example at one time the pinnacle of the ESB was 1,472 ft, however following in antenna swap it is now 1,454 ft. But when dealing with the larger category of "all freestanding structures" it is common to use pinnacle height instead despite its impermanence since sometimes the entire structure in question is not intended to be permanent. I think a footnote here would be helpful to avoid confusion though. 71.62.176.24 (talk) 20:05, 1 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Actually it looks like User:Furius has removed it already and trying to explain what the different criteria are for different categories and why in order to provide appropriate context and avoid confusion might just be too much intricate detail for the lead section come to think of it. 71.62.176.24 (talk) 20:10, 1 February 2024 (UTC)

Design time
I've already changed the statement that "the drawings were done in two weeks" to something more realistic. Nobody, least of all in 1928, designs and engineers a house in two weeks, much less a 103-story building. I think an initial concept came out in two weeks, and from what I see from an unciteable-but-probably-correct blog, the seventeenth variation was taken for development in October 1928. Shreve, Lab & Harmon were contracted on September 9. There is no doubt that it was fast-tracked, but we need to stay away from confident assertions that design was completed on two weeks - that would result in unbuildable drawings, or just plain disaster. Construction didn't start until March 1930, and the site wasn't even fully assembled until November 1929. Design took about a year. I'm looking for definite sources that don't repeat what WP says.  Acroterion   (talk)   04:11, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 27 May 2024
Navigating from the introduction to the 'Zeppelin' page, I noticed that the section under 'spire' in the 'Architecture' article mentions rather ambiguously mentions "docking", and only later in the paragraph refers to "airships"

Thus, for clarity, in the first paragraph of the Architecture > Spire > Above the 102nd floor section, I would suggest inserting this sentence copied directly from the introduction to the article on Zeppelins after the first sentence; "... above the 86th floor."

"The spire of the Empire State Building was originally designed to serve as a mooring mast for zeppelins and other airships, although it was found that high winds made that impossible and the plan was abandoned.[5]", as well as its corresponding footnote. Revloren (talk) 17:46, 27 May 2024 (UTC)


 * ✅ ABG (Talk/Report any mistakes here) 06:19, 30 May 2024 (UTC)