COUNCILLORS FOR THE city of Paris have voted in favour of constructing a gigantic triangle-shaped skyscraper in the city – the Tour Triangle.
It will be the first such building to be constructed in the French capital in over 40 years and will vie with the Eiffel Tower for dominance of the Parisian skyline.
The enormous triangle will stand 180 metres high and will be built at a cost of roughly €650 million.
The plan to construct the building (which has been on the cards since at least 2008) was initially voted down by the council last November.
At the time Mayor of Paris Anne Hidalgo said she would launch a legal appeal against that vote after several councillors displayed their vote cards in what was supposed to be a secret ballot.
The official website for the tower suggests that the finished building will house a 120 room four-star hotel together with 70,000 square metres of office space.
The building will be designed by Swiss architecture firm Herzog & de Meuron who have been attached to the project since the beginning.
Their previous credits included the Bird’s Nest stadium built for 2008′s Beijing Olympics and the ‘Jenga’ tower at Tribeca, New York.
Not everyone in the capital is overjoyed at the prospect of the new skyscraper, as evidenced by the previous negative council vote.
Residents of the 15th arrondissement in the south-west of the city have complained about the building’s energy efficiency and its unsuitability for Paris’ housing requirements.
It is after all the first such building to be constructed in Paris since the Tour Montparnasse was built in 1973.
That particular building stands as the only such high-rise on Paris’ skyline, and has made it next to impossible for developers to gain planning approval for similar sized constructions given its common perception locally as something of an eyesore.
With AFP
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