It is said the quest for height began with the towers in San Gimignano, Italy, built for self-defense. The gothic cathedrals which symbolized the power of the church and in which light was synonymous with God led to a perfection of structure making them even higher. Much later the 55 story Woolworth building was built in New York City, only to be dwarfed by the Chrysler building, 77 stories high. The refinement of ore into cast iron and, together with Elisha Otis' invention of the passenger elevator, enabled Gustav Eiffel to build his 1000-foot tower. William Jennings got the idea for the exterior skeleton when he saw his wife place a large heavy book on their bird cage - and the modern skyscraper was born. The Empire State Building was followed by the, taller still, World Trade Center, and later the Sears Tower in Chicago. The introduction of diagonal bracing and tuned mass damper, first used in Citicorp in New York City drove the buildings still higher, until more recently Cesar Pelli overlapped two squares to produce Petronus Tower in Malaysia, the tallest high-rise in the world. The proposed Seven South Dearborn in Chicago is 70 feet taller, and currently Japan is designing a half-mile high crossed braced cone as well as Sky City, 1000 high.
Personally I hope that this obsession with height translates into an effort to build a three-dimensional urban landscape. A desire not to build the tallest building but the greenest. A macro structure in keeping with the fundamental principles of ecological architecture. Most people do not like being in tall, thin skyscrapers because they feel the building may topple over. Even though this is an unlikely possibility, nevertheless, the psychology of individuals who harbor this frightening apprehension must be addressed. People prefer structures which epitomize stability and strength - those which are securely bound to the earth as opposed to those that daringly project out into space or directly up into the clouds. The psychology of space points, once again, toward 3-dimensionality.
Macrostructures with elevated platforms (planters) stepped in a pyramidal form, wide at the bottom and narrower at the top - each platform having an abundance of vegetation, patios, ponds, vines and even edible plants. Our proposed Omega Center provides a usable floor area of approximately 36,544,872 square feet (1.31 square miles) but has a footprint of only 2,085,915 square feet (0.07 square miles). Conventional sprawling development made up of two story houses and buildings would require 18,272,436 square feet (0.66 square miles) to achieve the same usable floor space: that is 9.4 times the footprint of the Omega Center. Three dimensional development at this scale then leaves 90% more land open as wilderness, farmland and recreational green space. The Omega Center also has gardens on all the rooftops.
