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Originally Posted by watchmanonthewall
To me personally this is not the best news. I live in the Nashville metro area and have been ecstatic over the growth Nashville has experienced. Being born in the 50s, I remember when for years the LC tower was the focal point of downtown. Then we got the batman and again went though a long period of not much activity. Sometime during the Bredesen administration things really took off. Obviously the last several years have been phenomenal. However, in my opinion, the skyline is starting to flatten out. These clusters developing around the lower Broadway area ( SoBro, The Gulch, Midtown, etc.. and even The Yards ) are starting to pull the eye away from the center of downtown because we are sort of stuck in this range of medium tall buildings. My personal opinion is that Nashville needs to break the 700 to 800 foot barrier soon or it runs the risk of becoming SanDiego, Vancouver, etc... These are beautiful cities but moving around them you sort of lose the sense of their true depth of development because without those sky piercing towers like many cities have in the center I believe you lose that wow/majestic sort of feel that should exemplify the status due a large, important, city. Does anyone else agree, or do you think I am making something out of nothing? I hope that I live long enough to see the skyline pulled back to the center with one or two marquee structures. No disrespect to anyone meant to anyone living anywhere else intended.
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Thanks for posting, and welcome! I think you'll find that Nashvillians here, on a website dedicated to the overall magnificence of the skyscraper itself, will surely agree with you that some more height would be a very, very welcome addition to the skyline. I do find it a bit bizarre that developers, outside of Tony G, seem to have some sort of irrational fear of breaking the 600 foot mark. So I'm certainly with you in hoping for more height in the future.
However, I don't think we should let our admiration for skyscrapers make us lose sight of what is really important. A nice skyline is fun to have. It makes for great postcards and aerial shots during sporting events. It gives you certain bragging rights and a bit of pride. But outside of that, what does it give you? Any benefit to increased height in the skyline is, let's face it, almost entirely superficial and aesthetic. Our desires for more height shouldn't take away our enthusiasm from a development like this. We're talking about three million square feet of high rise, mixed-use development that would be a MAJOR boost to the economy, provide jobs, and be a catalyst for future development on the East Bank. And at the end of the day, all of those things are far, FAR more important to the city's future than how it looks in a postcard, which, even without a supertall, still looks pretty damn nice.