examining the Citicorp case: ethical paragon or chimera - Re

The architect for the fifty-nine-story Citicorp Center tower completed during 1977 in midtown Manhattan was the much-celebrated Hugh Stubbins. The renowned structural engineer William LeMessurier was responsible for the conception and design of the building's ingenious structural framing system.

As part of the land acquisition negotiation for Citicorp Center it was agreed that Saint Peter's Lutheran Church located on one corner of the nearly full-block site since 1903 would retain its location. Citicorp would erect a new church building and, as part of its new headquarters complex, an office tower utilizing a portion of the air rights above the church.

That decision led to a unique structural system for a tower supported on a central service core and four 114-foot high piers placed not at the corners, but at the center of each tower face. The edges of the tower floors were then supported on a series of enormous eight-story-high cantilevered steel frames transferring their loads seventy-two feet from each corner to columns centered above the nine-story-high piers.

The extraordinary structural efficiency of the steel frame made the tower significantly lighter than a conventional structure of its height and therefore far more subject to lateral harmonic vibration due to the buffeting of winds. Working with other consultants, LeMessurier designed an innovative system to diminish the accelerations caused by the vibration. The tuned mass damper, a block of concrete weighing more than four hundred tons floating on a film of oil and linked to the top of the structural frame by hydraulic springs, was the first of its kind in a tall building.

Citicorp Center was designed and constructed during an extended period of economic malaise in the city. In the 1970s dozens of major corporations departed, 600,000 jobs were lost, (1) and, in the face of a fiscal crisis, the President's 1975 decision on Federal aid prompted the legendary Daily News headline "FORD TO ClTY: DROP DEAD." (2) Even before its completion, full-page color advertisements appeared featuring a photo-realistic view of the new church and the soaring tower. Citicorp's ad copy brashly proclaimed:

A skyscraper in the New York tradition, 59 stories. A multi-million-dollar investment in New York. New York is our town....We grew up here. We're staying here. (3)

The tower, clad in alternating ribbons of bright aluminum and glass, and crowned with a triangular prism, added a dramatic new corporate icon to the city's storied skyline. No less significant in attracting public and professional attention and praise was the design of the elements at the base of the tower. An enormous skylight illuminated a seven-story galleria, and a lushly landscaped courtyard was surrounded by shops and restaurants linked to brick paved public outdoor spaces incorporating seating, sweeping stepped terraces, access to the subway, and space for concerts and other events sponsored by Citicorp and by the church (the "jazz church" as it is commonly referred was well-known for holding block-long events-including the memorial service for Louis Armstrong). Stubbins and his collaborators had succeeded. The new building epitomized the client's intention to create a visible statement announcing its corporate identity, celebrating its steadfast loyalty to New York, its commitment to innovation, and i ts performance as a responsible citizen in the neighborhood and the larger city.

Extended feature articles in leading American and international architectural journals extolled the project. Citicorp Center was the subject of broad attention as well as great praise in the popular media. The city, the client, the architect, the structural engineer, and the multitude of others that had contributed to realization of the project took understandable pride in what had been created. More than a generation later, the tower remained a New York landmark, and an important symbol for the successor owner, Citigroup, which adorned its 1999 Annual Review with a striking image of the still-potent corporate icon.

The initial acclaim had not subsided when, through a series of serendipitous events, William LeMessurier recognized in June 1978 that the Citicorp tower's steel frame was structurally inadequate. (4)

Information about the details of his discovery and the actions that averted an epic disaster was secreted for the better part of two decades by LeMessurier, other engineers, academics, attorneys, equipment manufacturers, construction contractors, government officials, public safety and emergency response agencies, and by the client, Citicorp. Once the public silence was broken in an extended May 29, 1995 article in The New Yorker, the case quickly became a staple element in engineering and architectural ethics teaching. In virtually every instance I have discovered, William LeMessurier's professional behavior and ethical conduct, as well as that of the other participants, has received high praise.

Representative examples include: