One Woodward Avenue

[Gannon]

As for the old lighting in the building, each group of lights was in what was referred to as a "tub". At the company I worked for office size and the corresponding number of "tubs" you had generally corresponded to your "grade" level and when a floor was reorganized and people changed offices, everyone was counting and comparing the number of light tubs they had....at least on a couple of the reorganization moves that I was part of. It was funny...you'd see all these people walking in to each other's offices and instead of looking at the occupant, they were looking up nonchalantly and counting! When the fluorescent ballast in a tub would start to go bad, boy did it stink!Another thing about my days at One Woodward....Partly because of MichCon being in the building, and partly because some people are just trying to stir up trouble, there were sometimes bomb threats. Each floor had designated people who were called "searchers" who had to go open every closet and look under every desk for anything suspicious. There were other people designated [[can't remember their title), to make sure EVERYONE left their desk and either went to the elevator area or down to the main floor, I can't recall exactly. I always thought that the company was wrong to have employees do the searching, but I guess with the frequency of false threats, it made more sense to them to do that than evacuate for hours for nothing. I also noticed it was usually the newest and youngest employees who were "searchers". Shows how much they thought we were worth, lol. I don't know when that practice was discontinued, but when I started there in 1971 it was in effect.

Great backstory on the 'tubs'...every time I'm there I look up at that odd ceiling construction...with all the old forced-air ducting cutouts and such. It does look a bit like a game-play grid.

As for the bomb threats, I guess that explains why DTE has such a h-u-g-e front campus, set well back from the road. Ugh.

Two of the people I know who work there currently have had experiences with the ghosts. One asked a building employee about it, and got confirmation that some of the cleaning staff just won't GO up to 20, which is only the worst floor, this spectre apparently simply likes to visit those who work beyond regular business hours. It has never been dangerous, or agressive...just an odd presence that lingers, a feeling as if someone is looking over the shoulder, then the strange noises...but the hovering is the common theme.

I don't think anyone of these folks have been around the building more than 10 years...so this must be only a relatively recent phenomena.


Cheers

[stasu1213]

Is Woodward One the only building in this country that resemble the World Trade Center towers? I think that it is a beautiful building. I am glad that someone had purchased it and will bring the building back to life

[Gistok]

Yamasaki designed other office towers... but One Woodward Ave. was his first office tower... and the WTC used many of the Gothic elements that he used on One Woodward Ave. Some of his other office towers were different. Also some of his Gothic design elements were also used on his 3 Wayne State University commissions. [[McGregor Conference Center, Education Building, DeRoy Auditorium).

Part of his portfolio....
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minoru_Yamasaki

[p69rrh51]

Yamasaki designed other office towers... but One Woodward Ave. was his first office tower... and the WTC used many of the Gothic elements that he used on One Woodward Ave. Some of his other office towers were different. Also some of his Gothic design elements were also used on his 3 Wayne State University commissions. [[McGregor Conference Center, Education Building, DeRoy Auditorium).

Part of his portfolio....
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minoru_Yamasaki

Gistok my niece is from New York and she always has to go by One Woodward when we are downtown.

[Gannon]

Gistok my niece is from New York and she always has to go by One Woodward when we are downtown.

That is pretty powerful.

Yamasaki tested some of his novel ideas at One Woodward before going on to do it larger [[and doubled) in the WTC, right? I was only in the WTC once, two weeks before it came down, and I have odd tugs at my heart once and again when pulling up to One Woodward.

[grumpyoldlady]

To: bringmepizza

Received your private message and tried to reply but your setting don't allow you to accept PM's. The answer to your question is "Yes....he was a very nice man".

[Onthe405]

Yamasaki tested some of his novel ideas at One Woodward before going on to do it larger [[and doubled) in the WTC, right?

While initially flattered to be chosen as architect of the WTC, Yamasaki was deeply uneasy about its eventual scale & height. His style was frequently described as "delicate" [[particularly evident in the WSU buildings & Seattle World's Fair)--words rarely used to describe the monolithic WTC.

One Woodward was his first highrise [[and engineering wise) stretched the limit as to what he felt comfortable with. When David Rockefeller & the Port Authority first commissioned the WTC, the tallest tower was only about 60 floors. Over the course of time, egos and hubris drifted out of control--along with the size of the towers: first one,then two. I envision Yamasaki presenting Rockefeller with a model, and Rockefeller saying "No! Taller! I want them even Taller!".

Given the stark, straight lines, it was Yamasaki who floated the idea of two identical offset towers in order to present the skyline with symmetry & perspective.

Once the proposed towers passed the 80 story threshold, Yamasaki handed over the engineering to Les Robertson.

[Islandman]

Very interesting.

There certainly was nothing delicate about WTC. For anyone who didn't get to see them in person, it made every other building in the Wall street area look comically small.

I used to work in Chase Manhattan Plaza, which is 60 floors and I think was the third tallest building down there [[Trump was second across the street). It was very weird being able to see New Jersey after 9-11.

[Gistok]

Thanks for the interesting perspecive Onthe405!

Since the outer walls were load bearing... the higher they went with the design... and the higher it got... the thicker the wall beams became.

This explains why my first view of the towers from the Jersey side [[I was crossing over to NYC via the George Washington Bridge)... why they looked so disappointing. They appeared as solid walls without windows from that far away. As the design got taller, the windows got narrower.

[cman710]

Very interesting.

There certainly was nothing delicate about WTC. For anyone who didn't get to see them in person, it made every other building in the Wall street area look comically small.

I used to work in Chase Manhattan Plaza, which is 60 floors and I think was the third tallest building down there [[Trump was second across the street). It was very weird being able to see New Jersey after 9-11.

[Channelling Gistok and his theater threads...] Chase Manhattan Plaza, designed by Gordon Bunshaft of Skidmore, Owings and Merrill, was completed in 1961 and was the first major skyscraper construction begun and completed in NYC's financial district in the post-war era. One block from Broadway, the building was the first in the financial district to be built on a "super block," with the design closing off one block of Cedar Street.

There are entrances to an underground plaza level from the street, and then there is an outdoor plaza one level above, which does not get nearly the pedestrian traffic that it should. The lower level has a Chase bank branch in it and there is an atrium upen to the plaza above. The bank branch always struck me as unusual because, at least of the early 2000s, it had no bulletproof glass, which was very unusual for the area. When I worked as a teller in Manhattan during college, I was trained in one of the basement levels of the building. My grandmother also worked there for some years as a secretary and my godfather works there now.

For a fascinating read in which David Rockefeller plays a significant role, I would recommend Eric Dalton's Divided We Stand: A Biography of the World Trade Center. The version of the book I read was dated before 9011, but I believe a new version was issued with a new forward. It is an interesting story of the political factors at work in downtown New York City and at the Port Authority in the 1960s and 1970s.

[Onthe405]

Since the outer walls were load bearing... the higher they went with the design... and the higher it got... the thicker the wall beams became.

.

Exactly. By the 1960s, the idea of shifting the support load to the outer walls became the standard design for most skyscrapers. In high rise office real-estate, it's all about flexible space. With no support columns breaking up the floors [[one of the weaknesses of buildings like Penobscot, Empire State, etc) there are substantially more configuration options.

This design in the WTC [[and, to a certain extent, MichCon/One Woodward) resulted in very narrow windows which obstructed the view. This is particularly ironic, considering the view is probably why a tenant would select a tall building in the first place.

Allegedly, when this point was brought up to Yamasaki, he reportedly sniffed "Office workers are not supposed to be looking out the windows--they're supposed to be working" [[not sure how that rule would apply to the patrons of Windows on the World or the indoor observation center)

In hindsight, an older, grid frame building would have held up better to the jet impact. The fire still would have been devastating, but there's a better chance the buildings would not have collapsed. Although the engineers successfully tested the impact of a 707 on the WTC, they didn't account for the resulting fuel fire melting the floor ties to the outer grid. Once the ties gave way, the "pancake" collapse began.

cman, I agree. The whole story behind Rockefeller/Chase Manhattan, the Port Authority, and the WTC is a riveting story of backroom politics, power, folly, urban history, ego, and greed. Much of the same ground is covered in Part 8 [[The City at the Center of the World) of Ric Burns' PBS documentary New York. The entire 2.5 hr film focuses on the WTC--from conception to that fateful day of its demise. Yamasaki's role is prominently featured.

[Gannon]

Gilbert finally zitted up this structure...placing six surveillance cameras PER corner pillar. How paranoid can this blossoming metromegalomaniac be?!

[tkelly1986]

Gilbert finally zitted up this structure...placing six surveillance cameras PER corner pillar. How paranoid can this blossoming metromegalomaniac be?!

When the police protection in the city is non-existent, he has to do something to keep his employees safe. This is yet another selling point for companies to move downtown. Paranoid? Realistic maybe...

[downtownguy]

Gilbert finally zitted up this structure...placing six surveillance cameras PER corner pillar. How paranoid can this blossoming metromegalomaniac be?!

Just as foolish as those Lord & Taylor folks in Boston. Who needs them?

[Honky Tonk]

Gilbert finally zitted up this structure...placing six surveillance cameras PER corner pillar. How paranoid can this blossoming metromegalomaniac be?!

He's probably concerned with how much time is being lost by smoking employees, and which ones are doing the smoking. Maybe even what it is they're smoking.....

[Gistok]

... or maybe he wants to put a face to each urine stain at the Hoedown and Fireworks festival...

[Honky Tonk]

... or maybe he wants to put a face to each urine stain at the Hoedown and Fireworks festival...

For that, I think he'd have the cameras much lower.....

[Gannon]

For that, I think he'd have the cameras much lower.....

There seems to be at least one, if not two, per column conveniently at emporer height. From every angle of approach, he has perfectly fucked up an otherwise beautiful facade. At least they're mostly white.