There was much discussion on whether the Petronas towers are actually taller than the Sears tower as the height of the antennas on the Petronas towers are included in the total height, while the height of the antennas are not included in the height calculation of the Sears tower as they are not considered an actual part of the building. With the construction of the 508m high Taipei 101 tower in 2004 this discussion became irrelevant. Anyhow, the Sears tower is still the tallest Chicago skyscraper, exceeding the height of the number 2, the Trump International Hotel and Tower by 27 meter (89 ft) and the Aon Centerby 96 meter (315 ft).Your journey to the top of the Willis Tower starts with a walk through an airport-style metal detector, followed by a slow elevator ride down to the waiting area where visitors queue for tickets. A sign will tell you how long you’ll have to wait to get up high; this is a good time to confirm the visibility. Even days that seem sunny can have upper-level haze that limits the view. On good days, however, you can see for 40 to 50 miles (64 to 80 kilometers), as far as the states of Indiana, Michigan. Iowa, and Wisconsin.While you wait, you can watch a film about Willis Tower factoids like its 43,000 mi (69,200 km) of phone cable and 2,232 steps to the roof. Then you’ll wait a little longer before the ear-popping, 70 second elevator ride up to the 103rd floor deck. From here, the entire city stretches below, and you can see exactly how Chicago is laid out.
Sears Tower now named Willis Tower
Sears Tower is history. As of Thursday, the iconic Chicago, Illinois, skyscraper is now named Willis Tower.At least that’s what the owners of the 110-story skyscraper now call it after its new main tenant, the London, England-based insurance broker Willis Group Holdings. However, there are plenty of people who refuse to call it that.More than 90,000 people have joined the group “People Against the Sears Tower Name Change,” on the social networking Web site Facebook.”This name change is absurd,” one member wrote. “Would Paris change the name of the Eiffel Tower? Or London change Buckingham Palace? Or New York, the Statue of Liberty? I believe the Illinois Congress needs to proclaim the Sears Tower a recognizable landmark that is known all over the world by people who have traveled to Chicago.”
Naming rights
Although Sears sold the Tower in 1994 and had completely vacated it by 1995, the company retained the naming rights to the building through 2003. The new owners were rebuffed in renaming deals with CDW Corp in 2005 and the U.S. Olympic Committee in 2008. London-based insurance broker Willis Group Holdings, Ltd. leased more than 140,000 square feet (13,000 m2) of space on three floors in 2009. A Willis spokesman said the naming rights were obtained as part of the negotiations at no cost to Willis, and the building was renamed the Willis Tower on July 16, 2009. The naming rights are valid for 15 years so it is possible that the building’s name could change again in 2024.Sears Tower is Good Place for vacation planning. The Chicago Tribune joked that the building’s new name reminded them of the oft-repeated “What you talkin’ ’bout, Willis?” catchphrase from the 1980s American television sitcom Diff’rent Strokes and considered the name-change ill-advised in “a city with a deep appreciation of tradition and a healthy ego, where some Chicagoans still mourn the switch from Marshall Field’s toMacy’s.” This feeling was confirmed in a July 16, 2009 CNN article in which some Chicago area residents expressed reluctance to accept the Willis Tower name, and in an article that appeared in the October 2010 issue of Chicago magazine that ranked the building among Chicago’s 40 most important, the author pointedly refused to acknowledge the name change and referred to the building as the “Sears Tower”. Time magazine called the name change one of the top 10 worst corporate name changes and pointed to negative press coverage by local news outlets and online petitions from angry residents
The Structure of Sears Tower
The building consists of nine framed tubes, which are actually nine skyscrapers on themselves taken together into one building. Originally, the plan included no less than 15 tubes, but when the planned hotel was taken out of the project, only nine tubes were used in the final designs. The nine tubes all reach forty-nine stories. At that point, two tubes end. The other rise up to the sixty-fifth floor. From the sixty-sixth to the ninetieth floor, the tower has the shape of a crucifix. Two tubes, creating a rectangular, reach the full height of 442 meter (1451ft).
The Skydeck
Sears Tower is a Great Place For Vacations. The Sears Tower observation deck, called the Skydeck, opened on June 22, 1974. Located on the 103rd floor of the tower, it is 1,353 feet (412 m) above ground and is one of the most famous tourist attractions in Chicago. Tourists can experience how the building sways on a windy day. They can see far over the plains of Illinois and across Lake Michigan to Indiana, Michigan and Wisconsin on a clear day. Elevators take tourists to the top in about 60 seconds, and allow tourists to feel the pressure change as they rise up. The Skydeck competes with the John Hancock Center’s observation floor a mile and a half away, which is 323 feet (98 m) lower. Some 1.3 million tourists visit the Skydeck annually. A second Skydeck on the 99th floor is also used if the 103rd floor is closed. The tourist entrance can be found on the south side of the building along Jackson Boulevard.In January 2009, the Willis Tower owners began a major renovation of the Skydeck, to include the installation of retractable glass balconies, extending approximately four feet over Wacker Drive from the 103rd floor. The all-glass boxes allow visitors to look through the floor to the street 1,353 feet (412 m) below. The boxes, which can bear five short tons of weight (about 4.5 metric tons), opened to the public on July 2, 2009.
Climbing
In August 1999 French urban climber Alain “Spiderman” Robert, using only his bare hands and feet, scaled the building’s exterior glass and steel wall all the way to the top. A thick fog settled in near the end of his climb, making the last 20 floors of the building’s glass and steel slippery.