What US city has the three tallest buildings in the United States (is this a trick question?)
September 8, 2007 7:48 AM   Subscribe

What US city has the three tallest buildings in the United states and is this a trick question?

I'm working at my part time job today as a visitor's assistant at a local chamber of commerce. There is some sort of large walkathony scavenger hunty thing going on today that happens yearly and every year I get dozens of people participating coming in to ask me questions. I am allowed to give them the answers if i have them, and while they are not allowed to use the internet, I am. A few people just came in; one of their questions was "What US city has the three tallest buildings in the United States?" This should be easy. I googled it but actually can't seem to find any information about one particular city having the top three tallest buildings in the US! I guessed Chicago, since the twin towers went down, but I can't find any internet confirmation that there is one city that is host to the top three tallest buildings. Anyone have any ideas on this since my google-fu is failing me? Alternatively, is this a trick question of some sort? I didn't get to see the question written out, it was just read to me, so there is some possibility that it was miscommunicated....anyway. Ideas? Answers? What do I tell the inevitable throngs besides "I don't know."??
posted by Soulbee to Travel & Transportation (9 answers total) 1 user marked this as a favorite
 
Best answer: List of Tallest Buildings in the US

Broken down several ways, but none of them meet your criteria. The top 3 are always split between Chicago and NYC
posted by chrisamiller at 7:52 AM on September 8, 2007


There we go.

The question seems broken to me, though - Empire State Building is sitting at No. 2
posted by Leon at 7:53 AM on September 8, 2007


Best answer: The three tallest buildings in the US, according to Wikipedia are the Sears Tower in Chicago, the Empire State Building in New York, and the Aon Center in Chicago. Since the fourth tallest is the John Hancock Center in Chicago, I would be inclined to think the answer they're looking for is Chicago. Perhaps they meant "What city has three of the tallest buildings in the US?"
posted by cerebus19 at 7:55 AM on September 8, 2007


The question is poorly written (to the point that it is completely wrong - no one city has all three of the tallest buildings in the USA) but they are probably referring to Chicago.
posted by Count Ziggurat at 8:10 AM on September 8, 2007


Is it possible that the question is just before it's time? The Chicago Spire, planned to be complete by 2010 will clock in at 2000 feet and if you look at the second listing on the Wikipedia page, the "by pinnacle height" that would give Chicago the three tallest buildings in the US. For like a year.
posted by FlamingBore at 8:15 AM on September 8, 2007


Just to drop in, I love the Skyscraper Page. I even tried looking at tallest structures, which tend to be very large tv towers in rural areas. But the top three are in two different states (top 2 in ND and one in CA). But that's sorted by antenna height. There's three different criteria: pinnacle height, roof height, and official height (maximum of those two heights).

Oh, maybe they're really before their time! By official height, in 2010 Chicago will have the 3 tallest: Spire, Sears, Trump. Until the Freedom Tower is built in NY.
posted by ALongDecember at 8:37 AM on September 8, 2007


Trick answer: NYC
-Empire State Building
-Chrysler Building
-New York Times Building

Sears is a tower; Aon and Hancock are centers.
posted by MtDewd at 9:25 AM on September 8, 2007 [4 favorites]


I was going to second Denver, but I dunno. MtDewd has a point as well.
posted by univac at 10:22 AM on September 8, 2007


Response by poster: thanks for the links and the help. Just to update you all, I did get the opportunity to see the question written (many many times now...) and it's actually "which US city hosts three of the FIVE tallest buildings in the country?" to which the correct answer is Chicago.
posted by Soulbee at 10:31 AM on September 8, 2007


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