Dive Brief:

After much debate regarding the height of the planned super-skinny Nordstrom Tower, New York YIMBY has reported that Extell Development executives and Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill architects are ditching their original plans for a spire but increasing the height of the Manhattan tower's roof — as the finished structure will stand at 1,550 feet tall.

architects are ditching their original plans for a spire but increasing the height of the Manhattan tower's roof That roof height will give the mixed-use Nordstrom Tower the title of the tallest building in the Western Hemisphere by rooftop height — dethroning the Willis Tower in Chicago, which has a roof height of 1,450 feet.

The changes to the plan, however, will keep the height — factoring in the spires — of the 99-floor Nordstrom Tower, or "Central Park Tower," below that of the One World Trade Center, which has a spire reaching 1,776 feet. Gary Barnett, president of the building's development company, told the New York Post last month that he would maintain his promise to keep the building's height slightly below that of One World Trade Center's spire "out of respect."

Dive Insight:

The Nordstrom tower will include seven floors occupied by a Nordstrom department store, five floors of a hotel, and the remaining 87 floors will be home to condominiums.

New York YIMBY noted that although designers have removed the plans for the spire, bringing the architectural element back later wouldn't be a complete surprise.

Now that the final plans have been released, cranes have arrived at the 57th Street site, and workers have begun pouring concrete. The 1.3 million-square-foot complex is expected to be finished in 2019.

The Empire State Building was New York's — and the world's — tallest structure from 1931, when it opened, until 1973, when construction of the original World Trade Center's 1,368- and 1,362-feet-tall towers bumped the landmark from the top of the list.