Archinect - News

Google updates Thompson Center renderings before first full year of construction

2024-11-06T17:56:00-05:00

The renovation of Helmut Jahn’s fought-over Thompson Center building in Chicago for Google has provided an updated pair of renderings for the $280 million project. The update follows last December’s release of the initial images for the reimagining. Google is pledging to deliver a LEED Platinum-certified project in line with the late architect's post-modernist vision. Initial demolition work began in May and will advance over the next year towards completion in the year 2026.

Image courtesy Google and Pixelflakes

Google updates Open Buildings data sets using AI

2024-10-28T10:46:00-04:00

In 2021, the Google Research Africa team launched Open Buildings, an open-source dataset of building footprints across the Global South produced using AI and high-resolution satellite imagery. The team had a simple vision: to fill a major gap in data for population and density in the developing world. Now in its third version, their dataset contains polygons for 1.8 billion buildings over an area of 58 million km² in Africa, South and Southeast Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean.

The data is useful in determining population size and other factors to solve urban density problems.

Google's Research product manager Olivia Graham says: "About 2.5 billion more people could move to cities by 2050, most of them in the Global South — this could be a real step change for governments and organizations working through that growth. If a city is planning where to put essential services like healthcare and education, or where to develop infrastructure like water and energy supplies, this dataset shows the areas that are actively growing."

The data can be explored via a searchable map using that's accessed here.

Chicago's Thompson Center begins demolition ahead of $280 million Google takeover

2024-05-03T17:12:00-04:00

NBC Chicago is reporting on the start of planned demolition work for the Thompson Center in advance of a $280 million makeover that will turn the famed Helmut Jahn-designed building into a new office space for Google for 2026. Work will cover the exterior glass curtain facade and interior atrium. The 39-year-old former state office building had become a $17 million-a-year liability for Governor JB Pritzker before the property was offloaded for $105 million in July of 2022.

“These types of improvements take several years to complete; we’re excited about what this project symbolizes for the greater Chicago community and will share more about our plans in the future,” Karen Sauder, Google's Chicago Site Lead, said in a December update.

Jean Dubuffet's 29-foot 'Monument with Standing Beast' sculpture is also being evacuated to the Art Institute of Chicago.

Is the architectural design causing serious Wi-Fi issues at Google's new Bay View headquarters?

2024-03-26T17:28:00-04:00

Google has not publicly disclosed the reasons for the Wi-Fi problems, but workers say the 600,000-square-foot building’s swooping, wave-like rooftop swallows broadband like the Bermuda Triangle. [...] But, a Google spokeswoman acknowledged, "we’ve had Wi-Fi connectivity issues in Bay View." She said Google "made several improvements to address the issue," and the company hoped to have a fix in coming weeks.

The roof of the BIG and Heatherwick Studio-designed Bay View headquarters, which opened in 2022, is a key component of the building’s circular design strategy and features 90,000 "dragonscale" solar panels. Some believe they could be causing the interference.

Related on Archinect: Google's BIG + Heatherwick-designed Bay View HQ campus opens. Photo: Iwan Baan, courtesy of Google

The other culprit would be the building’s internal layout and configuration and the density of routers within it (H/t various Reddiors). Google would not publically address the source of the connectivity issues.

Operations at the company's other new headquarters inside the St. John’s Terminal in Manhattan, which opened in February, however, appear to be running a bit more smoothly.

Google NYC's new adaptive-reuse HQ design by Gensler and COOKFOX opens at Hudson Square

2024-02-27T12:52:00-05:00

Google’s brand new New York City headquarters inside St. John’s Terminal at Hudson Square has opened following the completion of a five-year and $2.1 billion project designed by COOKFOX Architects and Gensler.

The renovation of the two-block-long former rail terminus yields a total of 1.3 million square feet of new offices. Another nine stories were added above the existing structure. The building will house some 3,000 employees of the tech giant, who said in a blog post that its design is responsive to a research-driven office strategy and supports a new workplace model that’s meant to foster greater collaboration, creativity, and growth.

Image: courtesy of Google

After restoring the original three floors remaining from its peak usage in the 1930s, the design team created a welcoming space defined by an exterior cut facade detailed on its northern side with reused rail beds that had been leftovers and are kept semi-exposed to create a visible linkage between past and present.

Image...

UCLA buys into Westside Pavilion conversion space formerly reserved for Google campus

2023-12-29T12:15:00-05:00

UCLA has purchased the former Westside Pavilion shopping mall near its campus, reports The Real Deal. The 580,000-square-foot office known as One Westside was formerly been leased to Google for a 14-year term, but was left vacant as the company’s staff reductions began in January of this year ended the deal.

The Gensler project was partially completed in 2022 at a cost of $475 million. The other 240,000-square-foot half of the mall has been redone by a developer called GPI and includes a mixed-use residential component enacted at what used to be the mall’s parking lot. Google had invested in a spate of other office conversions highlighted by the $280 million Thompson Center project in Chicago, earning it praise as one of corporate America’s leading proponents of adaptive reuse strategies.

According to The Real Deal: “UCLA has not said what it wants to do with the three-story indoor mall, wh...

Google unveils updated renderings for Thompson Center rejuvenation

2023-12-13T17:11:00-05:00

New renderings for Google’s $280 million redevelopment of the Helmut Jahn-designed James R. Thompson Center in Chicago have been released by the company ahead of the start of construction activities early next year.

The announcement was made via Google’s The Keyword blog and appears to show improvements to the ground-level plaza area, facades, and HVAC system, minus the significant alterations to the atrium that were first detailed by Chicago Sun-Times columnist Lee Bey back in October.

The existing colonnade and plaza at street level will be redesigned to allow for more food, beverage, and retail opportunities, along with seasonal activations for the public. JAHN, its original architect, will lead the overhaul in line with Google’s pledge to deliver a LEED Platinum and all-electric building. The “postmodern legacy” of their late founder's design will reportedly also be “honored” by retaining its 17-story atrium space — an area that became a point of contention for preservationists ...

Google scraps $15 billion Silicon Valley development deal with Lendlease

2023-11-06T12:28:00-05:00

Google has scrapped a $15 billion development deal that would have benefitted California’s Silicon Valley with new modern office parks, affordable housing, and mixed-use districts, according to reports published by CNN and Reuters late Friday.

The deals struck with Australian multinational Lendlease cover planned developments in and around Santa Clara County, California, including Sunnyvale and three others in San Jose and Mountain View. Google had previously announced its plans to reduce its company size by about 6% at the beginning of the year.

Both Lendlease and Google had released statements expressing their continued pursuit of the projects in April when the San Jose Downtown West development’s start of construction was put on hold indefinitely. Lendlease now says the four-year-old deal is no longer “mutually beneficial given current market conditions.”

The news strikes a major blow to the faltering...

Major demolition plans announced for Thompson Center facade and atrium

2023-10-18T12:04:00-04:00

Significant alterations to the exterior of Helmut Jahn’s aging James R. Thompson Center have been revealed inside of planning documents submitted for Google’s forthcoming $280 million renovation of the landmark former government office building in Chicago.

The building’s glass facade and atrium will now be demolished in its entirety at a cost of $6 million, according to permitting documents issued by the city’s Department of Buildings on October 13th. Lee Bey was first to report the news in the Chicago Sun-Times Tuesday when a spokesperson for the tech giant promised a formal announcement could come “within weeks” as the planning process moves along.

Landmarks Illinois’ President and CEO Bonnie McDonald told Bey the demolition would “add to the waste stream” of the building’s carbon lifecycle, though did admit the reuse plan was a “big win” over previous fears it would either be razed or topped by a new supertall construction.

Added McDonald: “While we realize losing the existing ...

Google pauses work on 'Downtown West' San Jose development

2023-04-25T11:48:00-04:00

As part of Google’s downsizing that went into effect early this year, the company has gutted its development team for the San Jose campus. The construction project, which was supposed to break ground before the end of 2023, has been put on pause, and no plan to restart construction has been communicated to contractors, according to people familiar with the matter who asked not to be named due to non-disclosure agreements.

The news broke on Friday amid a sector-wide fallout caused in part by the tech recession. CNBC reported that some sources now speculate as to whether or not the 80-acre development will be completed at the same scale though both LendLease and Google have reaffirmed their commitment to it in written statements. Google has now incurred $500 million in losses for the first quarter of the year alone on office lease exit fees.

Previously on Archinect: Google wins approval for 'Downtown West' mega campus in San Jose

Kohn Pedersen Fox, Heatherwick Studio, Grimshaw Architects, SHoP Architects, Solomon Cordwell Buenz, SITELAB urban studio, and West 8 were among the design firms attached to the construction, which was to be the single largest in San Jose history. The project was approved in 2021 after years of planning and an exchange with local opposition groups that ended in the decision to commit to adding $450 million worth of affordable housing and other community initiatives.

Thompson Center sculpture will be relocated following building's sale

2022-08-01T19:31:00-04:00

One of Chicago’s iconic pieces of public art will be getting a new home. French artist Jean Dubuffet’s sculpture “Monument with Standing Beast,” in place in front of the Thompson Center since the building opened in 1985, is moving to a different spot in the Loop.

Following last week’s $105 million sale of the Thompson Center to Google, the famed Dubuffet sculpture will be relocated to a former bank building at 115 S. LaSalle Street, a space purchased by the state of Illinois to house office space lost with the sale. The 29-foot, 10-ton fiberglass sculpture was seen as an extension of the Helmut Jahn-designed building. Nicknamed “Snoopy in a blender,” the piece is made up of four shapes representing an animal, a tree, an architectural form, and a portal. It was inspired by Dubuffet’s 1960 series of paintings called Hourlope.

Previously on Archinect: Google will take over Thompson Center following $105 million sale

“Monument with Standing Beast” was donated in 1984 by Ruth Horwich, an art collector and co-founder of Chicago’s Museum of Contemporary Art, in memory of her husband, Leonard Horwich. It was unveiled outside an under-construction Thompson Center in November of that year. A date for the sculpture’s arrival at its new home has not bee...

Evan Jahn on the Thompson Center sale, office design, and continuing his father’s legacy

2022-07-30T09:00:00-04:00

It’s our duty to give them our perspective, but it always ends up being a collaboration between what our ideas and knowledge are, and what their vision is. I would be doing anyone in development a disservice if we didn’t propose and push for something that is greater than what initially is the expectation. Like many things in life, you think you can run a mile this fast, and then someone challenges you to run a little bit faster and you figure out you can. You’re always moving the bar.

The younger Jahn, now president of the firm his late father established, spoke with TRD about the recently-announced sale of Helmut Jahn's most famous work, commenting that the 37-year-old Thompson Center would be “enhanced to a level and expectation of a 21st-century office” before shutting down speculation about a potential new high-rise being constructed above it. He also mentioned some of the post-pandemic challenges his firm and others designing office spaces are facing and said that working with a well-versed client like Google presents, for him, a career-defining prospect.

“They’re beyond a bellwether. They’re really almost setting a new precedent in how they’re defining the workplace, with their projects in multiple areas,” he said. “They’re really trying to reconceptualize this 21st-century hybrid work environment.”

Google will take over Thompson Center following $105 million sale

2022-07-27T14:58:00-04:00

The sale of the iconic Thompson Center in downtown Chicago is being finalized with Google planning to occupy office space following extensive renovations by the new owner. Google will take over the entire building once the new owners, JRTC Holdings, renovate the Thompson Center to the tech giant's specifications.

With its future sorted, the Helmut Jahn-designed building is here to stay. A sale agreement with JRTC Holdings was finalized in March; however, today’s announcement includes revisions to the agreement and the addition of Google as the primary tenant.

Originally, Illinois was set to receive an initial payment of $70 million for the property and would retain 425,000 square feet of the office space. Now, the entire space will be purchased for $105 million. The state will use $75 million of this total to purchase a site at 115 S. LaSalle Street where approximately 1,800 state workers from the Thompson Center will move.

Previously on Archinect: Thompson Center may find new life as Google's Chicago office

JRTC Holdings will now renovate the building, and once complete, Google will purchase the site. The renovations will reportedly respect the original design of the building, with changes aiming to make the structure more energy-efficient, environmentally sustainable, and inclusive. Goog...

Thompson Center may find new life as Google's Chicago office

2022-07-04T09:00:00-04:00

Google is negotiating to buy the spaceship-like James R. Thompson Center in Chicago in a deal that could provide a much-needed boost to the city’s Loop business district. The Mountain View, California-based tech giant is seeking to buy the Helmut Jahn-designed building at 100 W. Randolph St., where it plans to expand its Chicago offices into a large portion of the 17-story building’s soon-to-be-renovated office space, according to people familiar with the deal.

The future for Chicago's James R. Thompson Center, designed by the late Helmut Jahn, may be looking a bit brighter after the National Trust for Historic Preservation added the postmodern gem to its annual “America’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places” list in 2019.

Last year, the Chicago Architecture Center and Chicago Architectural Club jointly hosted a design ideas competition to promote adaptive-reuse scenarios for the center and save the landmark building from the wrecking ball.

Meet the first class of Harvard Climate Justice Design Fellows

2022-05-24T11:02:00-04:00

Harvard University has today announced its first-ever cohort for the brand new Climate Justice Design Fellowship, recognizing young leaders across the country in the fields of environmental justice advocacy, law, and climate organizing.

The first class of fellows consists of seven members, primarily from the non-profit sector. Each fellow will be tasked with pursuing data-oriented tools (e.g., the First Street Foundation’s new wildfire risk map) to aid their individual communities’ strides toward environmental justice.

The fellowships are funded through Harvard’s Institute for Quantitative Social Science (IQSS) and are pilot programs of the broader Harvard-Google Data+Climate Initiative that incorporates proprietary innovations like Google Data Commons and the data visualization service Glue to further empower both scholars and engineers to fight challenges related to climate change.

The progress of the fellowship can be followed online on both Twitter and Instagram. Scroll down to...

Google's BIG + Heatherwick-designed Bay View HQ campus opens

2022-05-17T18:55:00-04:00

Google has announced the opening of its new Bay View campus in Mountain View, California, with the neighboring Charleston East project in its final phase of construction. Together, they form the latest additions to Google's headquarters.

Photo: Iwan Baan, courtesy of Google

The web giant celebrates the first time it led the concept and construction of one of its own major campuses, boasting an extensive list of human-centered, sustainable features.

According to Google's project announcement, Bay View is an all-electric, net-water-positive facility with the largest geothermal installation in North America. Both projects report being the largest buildings in the world to pursue LEED-NC v4 Platinum and the largest to pursue elements of the International Living Future Institute (ILFI) Living Building Challenge (LBC) Petal Certification.

Photo: Iwan Baan, courtesy of Google

Designed in collaboration with Bjarke Ingels Group and Heatherwick Studio, the campus officially broke ground in 2...

Now Google Maps can see inside buildings thanks to AI

2022-05-13T12:06:00-04:00

Google launched a new mode for Maps on Wednesday, designed to give users a more real-life look at the places they’re going before they even go. The new Immersive View is sort of a Street View in the sky: you can look over a location from above to get a sense of the neighborhood and then drop to street level to see the specific spots you might want to hit up.

The feature was revealed at Google’s I/O 2022 Keynote address in which CEO Sundar Pichai also introduced a new flood forecasting feature and expanded capabilities of the 15-year-old Maps project made possible through advancements in AI technology. Pichai says the company now has 1.6 billion buildings and over 60 million kilometers of road to date as part of the project.

The Immersive View feature will now allow the interiors of a good portion of them to be seen using a machine learning technique called neural rendering. Pichai used London's Westminster area as an example and said the feature is useful in providing pedestrian and vehicle congestion information to users in real-time.

Clive Wilkinson says he regrets the role he played in the Googleplex's design

2022-01-24T17:35:00-05:00

For more than three decades, Clive Wilkinson has been among the most sought-after office designers in the world. He has planned spaces for the likes of Microsoft, Disney, Intuit and other companies seeking unorthodox approaches to work life. But he now has regrets about what is perhaps his most famous work: Googleplex, the tech giant's posh headquarters in Mountain View, Calif.

Wilkinson’s statements offer a rebuke to the Silicon Valley culture he played a role in pioneering and now deems to be "fundamentally unhealthy." The $1 billion office complex in Mountain View, California designed by STUDIOS Architecture with interiors by Wilkinson is serviced by a secretive $250 million transportation network and is famous for its plush employee perks that Wilkinson now says he regrets.

"This notion that you can provide everything that would support a worker's life on campus might appear to be extremely generous and supportive," he told NPR’s Bobby Allyn. "But it also has a whole range of potentially negative impacts. Work-life balance cannot be achieved by spending all your life on a work campus. It's not real. It's not really engaging with the world in the way most people do. It also drains the immediate neighborhoods of being able to have a commercial reality."

Relisten to Archinect's 2016 podcast interview with Clive Wilkinson

Wilkinson also stated that he do...

Form followed finance in 2021, for better and for worse

2021-12-25T09:00:00-05:00

2021 was a year where form continued to follow finance. Throughout the year, our coverage included many examples of the world’s largest architecture firms designing for some of the world’s largest companies. From sleek corporate headquarters to “work-and-play” tech campuses, such projects take on an added significance when searching for clues on the future of work and offices post-pandemic.

However, as we followed the money this year, we also took time to reflect on what lies in its wake. What are the social ramifications of large tech companies landing space-age campuses on areas already creaking from a lack of affordable housing? What does the growing proliferation of Amazon fulfillment centers mean for traditional retail typologies? What are the human consequences of placing the governance of civic space in private hands?

To further explore this point, we have rounded up the highlights of our 2021 coverage on the intersection between architecture and corporatism — for better and...

Zuckerberg's metaverse is only the latest chapter in big tech’s relationship with architecture

2021-11-10T11:14:00-05:00

Over recent weeks, Facebook’s rebranding and embrace of the metaverse has added a further dynamic to the role of digital space in our future lives. While the definition of the metaverse has been adapted numerous times since its coining in Neal Stephenson’s cyberpunk novel Snow Crash in 1992, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg describes it as an immersive digital experience where users can “do almost anything you can imagine—get together with friends and family, work, learn, play, shop, create—as well as entirely new categories that don't really fit how we think about computers or phones today.”

The recent discourse surrounding the metaverse is of interest to architects for two reasons. Facebook is far from the first company to imagine or build a metaverse; adaptable virtual worlds have captured our fascination for decades through games such as Fortnite, Minecraft, Sims, or World of Warcraft. In our previous interview with Kazys Varnelis from the Network Architecture Lab, we discussed ...

Google will buy St. John’s Terminal building in Hudson Square for $2.1B

2021-09-21T14:47:00-04:00

Google announced plans to purchase the St. John’s Terminal building in Hudson Square for $2.1 billion during the first quarter of 2022. The tech giant already leases the former freight terminal, which is currently undergoing a major renovation and addition as part of the company’s new 1.7 million-square-foot campus in the neighborhood. The deal marks the priciest sale of a single office building in the country since the pandemic, as well as one of the most expensive ever recorded.

View more details about St. John's Terminal by COOKFOX on their Archinect profile by clicking this link.

Pelli Clarke Pelli's Google Tower is ahead of schedule

2021-08-24T17:25:00-04:00

Block 185 or “Google Tower,” the future site of Google’s regional headquarters in Austin, Texas, is ahead of schedule according to Construction Dive.

Construction of the 35-story office building, designed by Pelli Clarke Pelli Architects and STG Design for developers Trammell Crow Company, began in March 2019 and was originally scheduled for completion in August 2022. However, this has been pushed forward to May, and in July, it was reported that the tower has topped out at 590 feet.

Previously on Archinect: Pelli Clarke Pelli's Austin tower for Google is making progress

As detailed by Construction Dive, a series of techniques were employed to keep the project ahead of schedule. Executives at DPR Construction, the project’s general contractor, highlighted these beneficial factors, which include: quick adjustments to working amidst the pandemic, early access to materials, access to a large amount of storage space, a strong workforce, great relationships with strategic partners and s...

Google wins approval for 'Downtown West' mega campus in San Jose

2021-05-26T11:04:00-04:00

Google’s major campus development in San Jose, California has been unanimously approved by city officials. “Downtown West” will see the delivery of 7.3 million square feet of office space for 20,000 workers, as well as thousands of housing units, spread across an 80-acre site. The scheme involves a number of prominent architecture and urban design firms, including Kohn Pedersen Fox, Heatherwick Studio, Grimshaw Architects, SHoP Architects, Solomon Cordwell Buenz (SCB), SITELAB urban studio, and West 8 (landscape design).

Image: Google / SITELAB Urban Studio

The project is the largest single project ever proposed for San Jose and is reported to cost more than $1 billion. The campus will include 4000 housing units, 1000 of which are allocated as affordable units in a state that needs 3.5 million housing units for all income levels over the next four years to meet demands. The scheme will also include 300 hotel rooms and 800 residences as short-term accommodation for corporate guests, ...

Pelli Clarke Pelli's Austin tower for Google is making progress

2021-04-13T15:24:00-04:00

Block 185, the downtown Austin office tower project best known as the future home of Google, has made significant progress since its groundbreaking back in the downright prehistoric era of 2019 — and though it hasn’t reached its full height of 594 feet just yet, the 35-floor building’s ever-growing prominence on the downtown skyline is becoming increasingly difficult to overlook.

The 35-story Block 185 office tower, designed by Pelli Clarke Pelli Architects in collaboration with the local office of STG Design for developers Trammell Crow Company, will be Google's regional HQ in Austin. Completion is scheduled in 2022.

Previously on Archinect: Pelli Clarke Pelli, Gensler projects reshape Austin's skyline

LA to pilot Google's "Tree Canopy Lab" technology

2020-11-25T14:42:00-05:00

Los Angeles announced last week it will pilot Google's new Tree Canopy Lab technology that combines AI and aerial images to assess the city's tree canopy, or tree cover density. The platform shows the tree canopy at the neighborhood level to identify gaps and determine where the city should make investments.

According to Smart Cities Dive, "Tree Canopy Lab is integrated into Google's existing Environmental Insights Explorer, which helps cities measure and track environmental data such as air quality and emissions from the building and transportation sectors. The data analyses allow cities to track their progress toward meeting climate action and sustainability goals."

Check it out here.

Google reveals more details for Downtown West San Jose project

2020-10-12T14:24:00-04:00

Google unveiled on Wednesday its most detailed vision yet for a transit-oriented neighborhood in downtown San Jose [...] Google’s village would add 7.3 million square feet of offices, 4,000 homes, shops, restaurants, a hotel, 10 parks, cultural and entertainment hubs, and immersive and interactive educational elements near downtown San Jose’s Diridon train hub.

Google's ambitious 80-acre, transit-oriented Downtown West plan first appeared on Archinect in October 2019 and involves a number of prominent architecture and urban design firms, including Kohn Pedersen Fox (related), Heatherwick Studio, Grimshaw Architects, SHoP Architects, Solomon Cordwell Buenz (SCB), and SITELAB urban studio.

More details can be found on the Downtown West project website and San Jose's Planning Division.

Google forges ahead with new office project in the Bay Area

2020-09-04T16:03:00-04:00

Just because prominent technology companies, including Twitter, Amazon, Apple, and others, have announced plans to extend work from home policies into 2022 and beyond, it doesn't mean they aren't planning for a return to the office somewhere down the line.

A case in point is Google, which continues to make significant investments in office projects around the country despite the doom-and-gloom predictions for office environments that shaped by media coverage in recent months.

The internet giant, along with Amazon, is currently pushing ahead with new leases in New York City, for example, in addition to pursuing a collection of ground-up developments in the Bay Area. The company's new Mountain View headquarters, designed by Heatherwick Studio and BIG, is currently under construction. While an even larger and more ambitious new proposal crafted in collaboration with developer LendLease, SERA Architects, Hassell and Kristen Hall City Design was announced earlier this week.

The propose...

Sidewalk Labs' Quayside project in Toronto is cancelled

2020-05-07T12:09:00-04:00

The Quayside project developed for the Toronto waterfront by Alphabet-backed Sidewalk Labs has been officially called off.

In a Medium post announcing the death of the project, Sidewalk Labs CEO Daniel L. Doctoroff writes that the economic collapse that has resulted from the COVID-19 pandemic has made the controversial $1.3 billion plan to reprogram a portion of Toronto's post-industrial waterfront into a new smart city prototype no longer viable.

Previously on Archinect: "Mass timber and high-tech meet in Sidewalk Labs' vision for Toronto." View of the Sidewalk Labs plan for its now-cancelled Toronto smart city project. Image courtesy of Picture Plane for Heatherwick Studio.

In the announcement, Doctoroff writes, "For the last two-and-a-half years, we have been passionate about making Quayside happen — indeed, we have invested time, people, and resources in Toronto, including opening a 30-person office on the waterfront. But as unprecedented economic uncertainty has set in around th...

New Google Arts & Culture initiative documents the threat of climate change to Unesco World Heritage sites

2020-02-06T16:14:00-05:00

Google Arts & Culture has launched a new online initiative calling attention to five Unesco World Heritage sites under threat from climate change. The Heritage on the Edge series reveals how rising sea levels, coastal erosion and extreme weather patterns are endangering landmarks across the world [...].

The five threatened Unesco World Heritage sites featured in the online Heritage on the Edge exhibit are Easter Island's iconic moai statues of Rapa Nui; the Old and New Towns of Scotland's capital Edinburgh; the flood-prone mosque city of Bagerhat in Bangladesh; Tanzania's port city of Kilwa Kisiwani endangered by coastal erosion; and the pre-Columbian adobe metropolis of Chan Chan, Peruvian at risk of drought and storms.

Image via Heritage on the Edge

"Above all, the project is a call to action," writes Professor Dr. Toshiyuki Kono, President of the International Council on Monuments and Sites, in a recent Google blog post. "Heritage on the Edge collects stories of loss, but also of hope and resilience. They remind us that all our cultural heritage, including these iconic World Heritage Sites, are more than just tourist destinations. They are places of great national, spiritual and cultural significance."

Heritage on the Edge. Video via Google Arts & Culture on YouTube.

"The realit...

"Human error" cited as cause for deadly 2019 crane collapse in Seattle

2019-10-23T18:43:00-04:00

The Washington State Department of Labor and Industries (L&I) announced Thursday that it has cited and fined three contractors a total of $107,200 in relation to April's deadly tower crane collapse at a Google office project. in Seattle. The crash to the street below killed two workers and two people in cars.

According to Construction Dive, the tragic event that occurred in April was due to the project "contractors and their workers [ignoring] the manufacturers instructions for dismantling the crane by removing almost all of the tower's pins and sleeves at the same time." It is reported that this weakened the crane and caused it to fall after a 45-mph gust of wind struck it.