Seattle - Space Needle
Seattle Space Needle
The Space Needle
is a tower in Seattle, Washington and a major landmark of the Pacific Northwest
region of the United States and a symbol of Seattle.
It is located at
the Seattle Center, it was built for the 1962 World's Fair, during which time
nearly 20,000 people a day used the elevators, with over 2.3 million visitors
in all for the World Fair.
Seattle Space
Needle Facts : The Space Needle is 605 feet (184 m) high at its highest point
and 138 feet (42 m) wide at its widest point and weighs 9,550tons. When it was
completed it was the tallest structure west of the Mississippi River. It is
built to withstand winds of up to 200 miles per hour (89 m/s) and earthquakes
of up to 9.1 magnitude, which would protect the structure against an earthquake
as powerful as the 1700 Cascadia earthquake. The tower also has 25 lightning
rods on its roof to prevent lightning damage. For stability, the foundation of
the tower was designed to be 30 feet (10 m) deep and 120 feet (40 m) across,
which required 467 concrete trucks to work a whole day to fill.
The Space Needle
features an observation deck at 520 feet (160 m), and a gift shop with the
rotating SkyCity restaurant at 500 feet (150 m). From the top of the Needle,
one can see not only the Downtown Seattle skyline, but also the Olympic and
Cascade Mountains, Mount Rainier, Mount Baker, Elliott Bay and surrounding
islands. Photographs of the Seattle skyline often show the Space Needle in a
prominent position, even appearing to tower above the rest of the city's
skyscrapers, as well as Mount Rainier in the background. This occurs because
the tower, which is equivalent in height to a 60-story building, stands more
than a kilometer northwest of most downtown skyscrapers.
Visitors can
reach the top of the Space Needle via elevators that travel at 10 miles per
hour (4.5 m/s). The trip takes 41 seconds, and some tourists wait in hour-long
lines in order to ascend to the top of the tower. On windy days, the elevators
are slowed down to a speed of 5 miles per hour (2.2 m/s). The Space Needle was
designated a historic landmark on April 19, 1999, by the City's Landmarks
Preservation Board.
The revolving
restaurant was an idea of John Graham, who had previously designed a similar
restaurant for the AlaMoana Shopping Center in Honolulu. It rotates 360 degrees
in exactly forty-seven minutes. The revolving top part was perfectly balanced
so that the restaurant could rotate with the help of only one tiny 1 hp
electric motor, which was later replaced with a 1.5 hp motor.
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