The "Torre Mayor" has held the title of tallest building in Mexico City since its completion in 2003. In fact, until 2010, it was the tallest building in all of Latin America. It has 55 stories and is 738 feet tall. It originally had an observation deck open to the public, but that has been closed. My friend Alejandro says (and I have not been able verify this story) that the U.S. Embassy obtained office space in the tower for the FBI, and that they insisted that the general public should not be allowed to go up to the top of the tower.
Right across the "Reforma" from the "Torre Mayor" is the rival "Torre BBVA Bancomer". I have been watching the progress of this building for several years since it is visible from the Condesa neighborhood where I usually stay on my visits to Mexico City. It was supposed to be completed in 2014, but, although it appears to have attained its full height, it is still not complete. When I was there yesterday, there was a long line of hardhats returning from their lunch break. The skyscraper will be the headquarters of Mexico's largest bank. I have read that it is supposed to be taller than the "Torre Mayor", but I have also read that its height is 738 feet, the same as the "Torre Mayor".
Next door to the "Torre Mayor" is another contender... "Torre Reforma". This skyscraper has progressed quckly since my last visit. It appears now to be as tall, or perhaps a tad taller, than the "Torre Mayor". When completed it will have 57 stories and be 800 feet tall.
I walked a few blocks behind the two buildings, and from this perspective you can see that the "Torre Reforma" is now as tall as the "Torre Mayor".
Going up the Paseo de la Reforma a bit, another skyscraper has just about attained its planned height. The "Torre Diana" is actually a block from "Reforma", but overlooks the boulevard's Diana Fountain. This building, however, will only be 33 floors high with a height of 518 feet.
Before long, however, all of these buildings will move down in ranking. There are a couple more buildings under construction that will be even taller. On the city's south side the "Torre Mítikah" will be 60 stories tall with a height of 876 feet.
 | ||||
| (image from the web) |
Artist's conception of the "Torre Mítikah"
However, by the time it is finished, Mexico's tallest skyscraper will not be in Mexico City. In the city of Monterrey, the "Torre KOI" will, upon completion, be the nation's tallest.
A few years ago, Gary Denness and I were wandering around near La Alameda, and we came upon a scale model of what Reforma was to look like in the future. Let me tell you, *MANY* towers are planned. Which makes me think that real estate in the vicinity of Reforma (Condesa, Roma, Cuauhtémoc, Juarez) will be a good investment. The thing that keeps me cautious is the likely further decline in the exchange rate when the Fed finally raises interest rates.
ReplyDeleteAnd let's hope that something taller than the Torre KOI is planned for DF. We can't be upstaged by the provinces, after all.
Saludos,
Kim G
Boston, MA
Where the city tries to keep buildings short.
I just worry that this construction boom is going to end up being a bubble. I don't know who is going to fill all that office space. As it is, I see office buildings all over with "se renta" signs.
DeleteSaludos,
Bill
Have you ever thought about either : A) putting Disqus on your site as a commenting system? Or B) moving to wordpress? The "prove you're not a robot" thing on blogger is getting ridiculous. Now you have to review a dozen pictures and pick out which ones might be soup or cake.
ReplyDeleteI really don't understand what's going on. My settings still call for no word verification. Babsblog suddenly started with the "prove you're not a robot" thing at the same time that it started with my blog.
DeleteAs for the dozen pictures... that I REALLY don't understand. I just signed out of "Blogger", and then went to my blog to try posting an anonymous comment. Yes, I had to prove I wasn't a robot, but it was just the normal picture of house numbers.
It's now alternating between squiggly text and pictures of food. For the food bit, you have about a dozen choices and you have to click all that are cake, or hamburgers, etc. Given that Wordpress' Akismet works perfectly without any of that nonsense it's rather surprising.
DeleteIt's also not that easy. On the hamburger one, I didn't click something that looked like chicken salad on a hamburger bun, but it turns out Google thinks that was a hamburger. So I had to click again.
I have a blogger blog which is simply a test for me. There's no content, but I wanted to understand what my blogger/blogspot friends were dealing with. I too turned off the word verification, but it won't go away. Apparently that's a bit of a bug that Google is working on, but it isn't yet fixed.
The galling part is that after dozens of comments where I've proved I'm not a robot, you'd think that Blogger would just let me through. Nope. Gotta identify food now.
Supposedly adding Disqus is easy, and for the reader it allows him/her to read your replies on any page that has disqus.
Anyway, just a thought. Saludos. KG
To post the above comment, I had to identify steaks. Very offensive for your vegetarian readership, really. ;-) (Fortunately, they were cooked.)
DeleteI just sent a complaint to Google. We'll see if it does any good. I'm going to try to make a comment on Babsblog to see if the same thing is going on with her blog.
DeleteI just posted a comment on "Babsblog", and all I had to do was identify numbers... no food pictures. Originally you didn't have to do any verification, but then around the same time as on my blog, you had to start proving that you are not a "robot."
DeleteI love how that area of Mexico hasn't been filled with skycrapers yet. That way, the three skyscrapers contending for the tallest will stand out maginificently. I can't wait to see the Torre Mitikah once it's finished as well. I'm sure it'll be a sight to behold. Make sure to keep us posted. Thanks for sharing that! All the best to you! :)
ReplyDeleteConrad Carroll @ Whiteoak Developments