Oh Not... Here We Gp
If you're scared of heights, it may be time to look away now. Not content with having the tallest building in America , the owners of Sears Tower in Chicago have installed four glass box viewing platforms which stick out of the building 103 floors up. The balconies are suspended 1,353 feet in the air and just out four feet from the building's Skydeck.
Floating on air: Visitors get their first view from The Ledge, four
Glass balconies
suspended from the 103rd floor of Chicago 's Sears Tower .
Designers say the platforms - collectively dubbed The Ledge - have
Been purposely designed to make visitors feel as they are floating above the
City.
The reward is unobstructed views of Chicago from the building's west
Side and a heart-stopping vista of the street and Chicago River below - for
Those brave enough to look straight down.
'It's like walking on ice,' visitor Margaret Kemp, from Bishop,
California said. 'The first step you take you think "Am I going down?"'
Long way up: Even the floor of the platforms are glass - few were
Brave enough to look straight down.
Fearless: People out on the floor of the 10ft square box which is 1,353ft up.
Spectacular: She also enjoyed amazing views out across the city
Thrillseekers: The boxes jut out four feet from the building and were
Specifically designed to make visitors feel as if they are floating
'The Sears Tower has always been about superlatives - tallest,
Largest, most iconic,' he said. 'The Ledge is the world's most awesome view, the world's most
Precipitous view, the view with the most wow in the world.'
The balconies are 10ft high and 10ft wide, can hold five tons, and
Have glass which is 1.5 inch thick.
Inspiration came from the hundreds of forehead prints visitors left Behind on Skydeck windows every week. Now, staff will have a new glass Surface to clean: floors. Architect Ross Wimer said: 'We did studies that showed a Four-foot-deep (1.2 metres) enclosure makes you feel like you're floating Since there's only room for one row of people, not two.' Skydeck attracts 25,000 visitors on clear days. They each pay $15 To take an elevator ride up to the 103rd floor of the 110-story office Building that opened in 1973.