Tension over crane inspection and safety has been playing out in downtown Chicago, where city building officials for nearly a year tried to force a supertall building developer to remove an idle tower crane from a mothballed project.
The 1,047-ft-tall Waterview Tower was set to become the luxurious Shangri-La hotel, but work halted in 2008 at the 25th floor due to a lending freeze. Since the shutdown, the site on Chicago’s prominent West Wacker Drive has become a ghost town, crane and all.