SAN FRANCISCO | One Rincon (Tower One) | 641 FT / 195 M | 60 FLOORS

[AK47KC]

Still going down.

[LWR]

Just got off the phone after contacting the offices of 1 Rincon Hill. The person who answered connected me with Mark C. Bon (sp?) who is in charge of their residental development. Of course, Mr. Bon did not answer, so I left a voice-mail message asking about the apparent removal of the tower crane... We shall see. "All things come to them who sit and wait. (black cats, bill collectors, process servers, etc..)

[LWR]

I just received a return call from Mr. Bon... he knows nothing about the tower crane, but said he would call again if/when he learned anything.

[WonderlandPark]

lower and lower....




????????????????

[Reminiscence]

This situation really is bizarre. I cant think of any other reason for why they would be lowering it, except maybe to change the location of the crane base, or because the crane itself is having mechanical problems. Perhaps it may also be that they need a more powerful crane as they get higher and higher into the air? Wierd.

[AK47KC]

It will be very strange to see no crane in the webcam late today or tomorrow. Besides, this lowering of the crane is taking a long time, since today is the 4th day of the lowering process. I guess progress will be stalled at like the 37th level for a long time.


Looks like the links connecting the crane with the tower are a hassle to remove.

[tyler82]

Sounds like a really tight operation they've got going on there, nobody knows what the hell is going on.

I wouldn't buy from people like this.

[mthd]

i can think of a couple of possibilities, most of which are very unusual.

1. they are switching to a different type of crane for the upper 1/3 of the building, possibly due to some quirk in the costs of rental or availability
2. they are changing the location of the crane due to some aspect of the shape of the building
3. there was a serious problem with the crane that could not be resolved in place
4. an unrelated technical issue has forced a temporary-but-not-brief stop in construction - e.g. the issues with the superstructure permit relating to the performance-based structural design, some aspect of the design of the exterior enclosure, etc, and in the meantime they don't want to pay for the crane.
5. bovis lend lease is pulling out and another gc is going to come in and resume construction with their own contracts with subcontractors including tower crane, etc
6. the developer is putting the project on hold due to financial difficulties


all that said, the only time i have ever actually seen this happen midstream like this is when a project is put on hold or cancelled. with so much positive sales activity on the units though, i cannot imagine them doing this.

very odd.

[tyler82]

Oh Boy, you mean we might get to have another sawed off midrise in downtown San Francisco!! I thought the day would never come...

[kenratboy]

Maybe they will just throw in the towel and demolish it, putting a Wal*Mart Supercenter in its place? If that doesn't make you wake up in a cold sweat, nothing will :-)

Honestly, this building is 'sold' and I cannot imagine it being anything worse than a minor technical issue (planned or not) and that it will be back under way soon.

[Reminiscence]

I dont know about that, I concider it a remote possibility. My best bet is they are either switching the crane's position to another position with respect to the tower, or the crane is merely experiencing mechanical difficulties. Seeming that nobody knows whats going on, even at the front office, I would think this problem came up sudenly and unexpectedly. Unforseen difficulties I would think, fits this problem more.

Is it just me, or does it seem that they are taking the crane down in a hurry, its barely visible anymore from the construction camera.

[AK47KC]

I wouldn't say the crane came down really fast, it took four days already to get the crane down 20-30 stories. Plus, the Rincon Hill site is down at the time of this post, so no more webcam of the lowering crane.

My own guess to this is that the vertical supporting structure of the crane can't hold up a taller and thus increasingly heavy crane (more extension pieces) and so they have to change the supporting structure pieces. To me, those vertical pieces look sort of thin to me, compared to the yellow crane at the Infinity II. 200 m or 656 ft. of crane supports and the top of tower crane itself on top put a lot of burden on the lower pieces.

[Reminiscence]

Originally Posted by AK47KC

I wouldn't say the crane came down really fast, it took four days already to get the crane down 20-30 stories. Plus, the Rincon Hill site is down at the time of this post, so no more webcam of the lowering crane.

My own guess to this is that the vertical supporting structure of the crane can't hold up a taller and thus increasingly heavy crane (more extension pieces) and so they have to change the supporting structure pieces. To me, those vertical pieces look sort of thin to me, compared to the yellow crane at the Infinity II. 200 m or 656 ft. of crane supports and the top of tower crane itself on top put a lot of burden on the lower pieces.

You make pretty good points, its definetly a possibility. But then again, should'nt they have known how much the crane could support before they started using it? In other words, why use a crane you is not going to get past a certain point, instead of another like the one you pointed out is at the Infinity Towers? Either someone made a huge mistake, something went wrong, or ... it was planned in the early contruction phases and thats why they may not be saying anything. Meanwhile, the crane is completely off the range of the camera, so hopefully they come out and say what the deal is soon.

[WonderlandPark]

This is damn rare, once placed, you really don't take the 2-3 weeks to move a crane location. No crane = no work, no concrete poured, ect. There are no setbacks or unusual features on this tower to warrant moving the crane, it is a straight up and down tower.

[mthd]

Originally Posted by WonderlandPark

This is damn rare, once placed, you really don't take the 2-3 weeks to move a crane location. No crane = no work, no concrete poured, ect. There are no setbacks or unusual features on this tower to warrant moving the crane, it is a straight up and down tower.

actually i'm pretty sure it does have two setbacks on the east side - one at L55 and another for the 'crown'. i would not think they are sufficient to warrant having to move the crane. there are plenty of places they could have located the crane to prevent that...

[AK47KC]

**Special to this thread only; no other thread has a webcam pic of a half-finished highrise with no crane in view.** Structure progress is stalled, although interior work can continue and as well as work on the townhouses.

They say this project moves at a rate of a floor every three days. I highly doubt they ever reached that speed, especially with a setback like this. I guess topout will be sometime in August.

If it's not the crane support that is the matter, then I guess the next best possibility is a mechanical problem with like the electrical motors, boom, concrete weights, etc. that can't be fixed when the crane is at 152 m or 500'.

[craeg]

I am sure they have their reasons for switching cranes - I am also sure that "putting the project on hold" is NOT one of them.
No need to obsess.

[Reminiscence]

Could it be that they are switching the location of the crane or replacing the crane not only for the setbacks, but also so that they can use that crane for the second phase (i.e. second tower)?

[AK47KC]

I don't know, maybe, there is a 82ft - 25m distance in between the two towers, so the boom will have to be extended quite a lot. Obviously, the crane won't go in the middle of the two towers, 41 ft. (12.5 m) away from ethier tower.

[BTinSF]

Has anybody considered walking by and asking one of the workers. Or, failing that, calling Bovis?

I'm emailing Carl Nolte at the Chron who just 2 weeks ago wrote this article about the crane: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl.../02/RINCON.TMP