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Wind sway can cause the cables in the elevator shaft to slap around and lead to slowdowns or shutdowns, according to an engineer who asked not to be named, because he has worked on other towers in New York with similar issues. A management email explained that “a high-wind condition” stopped an elevator and caused a resident to be “entrapped” on the evening of Oct. Many of the mechanical issues cited at 432 Park are occurring at other supertall residential towers, according to several engineers who have worked on the buildings.Īll buildings sway in the wind, but at exceptional heights, those forces are stronger. The case was settled quietly the next year. The would-be buyer, who was in contract for a $46.25 million apartment, was a member of the Beckmann family, the owners of the Jose Cuervo tequila brand, according to sources familiar with the suit. The anonymous buyer of unit 84B cited a “catastrophic water flood” that caused major damage to the 83rd to 86th floors in 2016 as grounds to back out of the deal. Abramovich’s apartment several floors below the leak, causing an estimated $500,000 in damage, she said. The disputes at 432 Park also highlight a rarely seen view of New York’s so-called Billionaire’s Row, a stretch of supertall towers near Central Park that redefined the city skyline, and where the identities of virtually all the buyers were concealed by shell companies.Īfter the first incident, water seeped into Ms. Engineers privy to some of the disputes say many of the same issues are occurring quietly in other new towers. Less than a decade after a spate of record-breaking condo towers reached new heights in New York, the first reports of defects and complaints are beginning to emerge, raising concerns that some of the construction methods and materials used have not lived up to the engineering breakthroughs that only recently enabled 1,000-foot-high trophy apartments.
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The claims include millions of dollars of water damage from plumbing and mechanical issues frequent elevator malfunctions and walls that creak like the galley of a ship - all of which may be connected to the building’s main selling point: its immense height, according to homeowners, engineers and documents obtained by The New York Times. Six years later, residents of the exclusive tower are now at odds with the developers, and each other, making clear that even multimillion-dollar price tags do not guarantee problem-free living. The nearly 1,400-foot tower at 432 Park Avenue, briefly the tallest residential building in the world, was the pinnacle of New York’s luxury condo boom half a decade ago, fueled largely by foreign buyers seeking discretion and big returns. Resident complaints at 432 Park, once the tallest residential building in the world, and a symbol of the luxury condo boom of the last decade, are revealing strife inside one of the city’s most secretive and exclusive towers. 432 Park, one of the wealthiest addresses in the world, faces some significant design problems, and other luxury high-rises may share its fate.
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