[NYguy]

Correct.

With a volume of 1.2 million cubic feet, this structure alone would be more than enough of a building in most parts of New York City. But on the Far West Side of Manhattan, which is being redeveloped at a gargantuan scale, it is merely a pedestal for a skyscraper that will eventually soar 995 feet.

The $1 billion skyscraper, called 1 Manhattan West, will not simply sit on this pedestal. It will balance on it.

The pedestal extends 42 feet beyond the building’s core to the north and south. The south overhang will suspend the tower over three parallel Long Island Rail Road tracks. The north overhang will act as a counterbalance.

.....the rail yard has been covered with a deck made of precast, hollow concrete segments that will form a public plaza when the project opens in 2019.

The deck could not possibly hold the weight of giant office towers. Instead, 1 Manhattan West will rise straight out of the bedrock cliff on the north side of the rail yard. It will overhang the deck and some of the tracks below.

What makes the overhang possible are 75-foot-long diagonal braces, called kickers, that transfer the weight of the tower and pedestal into the building core.