A Hanging Building.

Kaipara and Waitemata Echo, 11 September 1914, Page 2

A Hanging Building.

From a 320-ton steel trapeze, 60ft. long, to be suspended 250 ft. above a New York street, the Consolidated Gas Company are (says the New York correspondent of the London "Daily Rbcpress). to hang a seven-storey building. Extraordinary engineering feats are common in New York, but there has been nothing here or anywhere else in the world like this. When the building is completed it will be the only one of its kind in the World. Two years ago the managers of the company thought that a 12-storey building on the site they possessed would be large enough. But they were wrong. They found that to meet their needs they would have to build on both ~ ■i^^jupf the twelvestorey hlock,«^fnti^Tlnuhl Miigher.» The twelve-storey> building now has a 19-storey block on either side of it, and the company decided to add seven new floors to the centre building, so as to level it up to the flanking blocks. It was found that the foundations of the centre block would not carry the extra weight, but the architect conceived the daring plan of suspending the new seven storeys over the top of the centre building. The steel bridge from which the new block will hang- will be supported at either end partly by the side blocks, but mainly by hidden columns going down to the ground. The new floors will be- built downwards. Not an ounce of extra weight will be placed on the twelve-storey building, and even if this were cleared away the seven new storeys above would hang securely in the air. tied to the giant trapeze across the roof.