The Millennium Tower - San Francisco

Currently Playing: A Long Saga that Isn't Over

Get your free digital copy of my overview of the biggest engineering disasters in the last 100 years. https://ftandc.com/top-engineering-disasters-from-the-last-100-years Built between 2005 and 2009, the Millennium Tower is a 645 foot tall residential building with 419 units located at 301 Market Street in San Francisco, California. The building's foundation has experienced a significant amount of settlement well beyond the values predicted by the geotechnical design engineer of record which has caused the building to tilt nearly 30 inches at the top floor. In this video, I describe what has been determined to be the cause of the building's performance problems and what the building stabilization efforts have been to date. Whether you're an engineer, a San Francisco native, or just fascinated by the interplay of urban development and nature's forces, this deep dive into the Millennium Tower saga is not to be missed. The current prices of the units in this building range from $600,000 to $14,000,000 with an average price of $1,500,000 per unit. News of the building settlement and tilt which had been occurring since the time of construction became public knowledge in 2006 which precipitated multiple, multi-million dollar lawsuits. This lawsuit led to a settlement to fund stabilization efforts which were just completed in the Summer of 2023 at a cost of over $100,000,000. Keep in mind that the buildings original construction cost was $350,000,000. The mix of professional engineers involved with a story of it's problems with design and construction that are widely followed by the public along with the hundreds of millions of dollars and thousands of lives at stake is extremely interesting. Please let me know your thoughts. Would you be willing to live in such a building even though it has been declared safe by the engineers and City officials who are responsible? Keep in mind that there are many skeptics who say that the building settlement is likely to increase over the many decades that this building is planned to be in service. Other engineers question the stability and safety of the Millennium Tower during a major earthquake. This video contains excerpts from copyrighted material. The use of these excerpts is protected under the principle of 'fair use' in copyright law. The purpose of including these excerpts is for commentary, criticism, educational, or transformative purposes, and they have been used sparingly in relation to the overall content of this video. The original source material remains the property of its respective copyright holder(s), and this video is not intended to compete with or replace the original work. No copyright infringement is intended. If you have any concerns about the use of your copyrighted material in this video, please contact us through the provided contact information. The use of the information set forth in this YouTube video is at the viewer's own risk. This information should be considered neither technical nor engineering advice. Users should consult with the relevant professionals for specific advice related to their situation.