{"story":["Auckland's central business district declined after 1960, as factories moved to cheaper land in the west and south and suburban shopping malls led to the closure of downtown department stores. In the 1980s, when Auckland replaced Wellington as New Zealand's financial capital, new high-rise office buildings reshaped its skyline. The Sky Tower began as part of a casino. In 1989 the government allowed casinos to be introduced in New Zealand. An early-1990s plan for a tower on Upper Symonds Street in Eden Terrace, alongside a shopping centre, was rejected over viewshaft issues, and a version clad in stainless steel was dropped because of its cost. The first casino opened in Christchurch in November 1994. Auckland's casino, SkyCity, was built on a central-city site between Victoria and Federal streets, originally for Harrah's Entertainment, and opened in early 1996 (Te Ara gives January; Wikipedia gives 2 February). The developers' brief called for a tower that would be both a high-quality tourist attraction and a telecommunications facility they could market. Like the casino beneath it, the tower was controversial at the time it was built.","Fletcher Construction built the tower, with the engineering firm Beca providing design management and structural, geotechnical, electrical and other engineering services. It was designed by Gordon Moller of Craig Craig Moller Architects. The tower is made of high-performance reinforced concrete: its 12-metre-wide shaft, which holds four lifts and an emergency stairwell, stands on eight 'legs' resting on 16 foundation piles drilled more than 15 metres into the sandstone. Building it used 15,000 cubic metres of concrete, 2,000 tonnes of reinforcing steel and 660 tonnes of structural steel. Keeping it dead straight took careful surveying. Measurements were taken from three surrounding points, the ASB Bank building, Mt Eden and the Coopers and Lybrand building, while lasers gave verticality readings and seven satellites fixed its exact position. Although Auckland is not an earthquake zone, special attention was paid to earthquake-proofing, and the tower was designed to resist 1-in-1000-year gusts of 200 kilometres an hour. The mast, weighing more than 170 tonnes, was too heavy for a helicopter, so it was lifted into place by a crane attached to the structure. A second crane then dismantled the first and was itself taken apart into pieces small enough to fit in the lift.","The tower opened on 3 August 1997, two years and nine months after work on it began. From the ground to the top of its mast it stands 328 metres, which made it the tallest free-standing structure in the southern hemisphere. It was designed to sway up to a metre in very high winds, and its lifts were fitted with technology that detects the movement and slows them down. The observation decks were clad in aluminium and blue-green reflective glass. Its public floors include three observation decks, the highest of them at 220 metres, and New Zealand's only revolving restaurant, 190 metres up, which turns once an hour. Sections of the main observation level have glass floors 38 millimetres thick, giving a view straight to the ground. The tower also became Auckland's main FM radio transmitter site and carries television, wireless internet and weather measurement services.","Te Ara calls the tower an instant city icon. It dominates the central-city skyline, and in Te Ara's view it comes a close second to the Beehive, Parliament's executive wing in Wellington, as New Zealand's most instantly recognisable building. It became the backdrop for Auckland's New Year's Eve fireworks. The casino at its base stayed more contested. A former mayor of Auckland, Dick Hubbard, remained critical of the casino while acknowledging that the complex itself had been good for the city, and critics argued that the casino contributed to problem gambling. The tower held the title of tallest free-standing structure in the southern hemisphere until 2022, when the Autograph Tower in Jakarta, Indonesia, surpassed it."],"sources":[{"title":"Auckland places – Auckland central business district","url":"https://teara.govt.nz/en/auckland-places/page-10","publisher":"Te Ara — the Encyclopedia of New Zealand"},{"title":"Engineering – Engineering after 1945","url":"https://teara.govt.nz/en/engineering/page-4","publisher":"Te Ara — the Encyclopedia of New Zealand"},{"title":"Auckland region – Driving the economy: 1980 onwards","url":"https://teara.govt.nz/en/auckland-region/page-11","publisher":"Te Ara — the Encyclopedia of New Zealand"},{"title":"Auckland region – Sport and leisure","url":"https://teara.govt.nz/en/auckland-region/page-14","publisher":"Te Ara — the Encyclopedia of New Zealand"},{"title":"City boosters and promoters – City buildings","url":"https://teara.govt.nz/en/city-boosters-and-promoters/page-5","publisher":"Te Ara — the Encyclopedia of New Zealand"},{"title":"Gambling – Lotto, pokies and casinos","url":"https://teara.govt.nz/en/gambling/page-5","publisher":"Te Ara — the Encyclopedia of New Zealand"},{"title":"Sky Tower (Auckland)","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sky_Tower_(Auckland)","publisher":"Wikipedia"},{"title":"SkyCity Auckland","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SkyCity_Auckland","publisher":"Wikipedia"}]}