Defenders of midtown skyline sanctity and Empire State Building owners Malkin Holdings can breathe easier today now that Vornado Realty Trust announced its plans that it may renovate the much maligned Hotel Pennsylvania rather than erect a towering glass challenger to the ESB and just ruin everything. The battle between the two buildings?one beloved, the other still a glass dream?was fought in the court of public opinion, before the City Planning Commission, and in many renderings that showed how the skyline would be dramatically altered by the addition of 15 Penn Plaza for good or bad.
For now it seems like more mundane concerns like a weak economy and a failure to attract big financial firms as tenants, along with competition from other development projects (e.g., Brookfield's four tower Manhattan West project on 9th Avenue) made Vornado decide that renovation of the Hotel Pennsylvania is a better short term bet than erecting an 1150-foot challenger to the Empire State Building.
For superfans of glassitechture, we once again present the most vertical of all renderings of 15 Penn Plaza, in tribute to what might have been.
· 15 Penn Plaza coverage [Curbed]
· Time-out seen in skyline war [NYP]
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