The JPMorgan Chase Tower, formerly Texas Commerce Tower, is a , , 75-story skyscraper at 600 Travis Street in

Downtown Houston, Texas Downtown is the largest central business district in the city of Houston and the largest in the state of Texas, located near the geographic center of the metropolitan area at the confluence of Interstate 10, Interstate 45, and Interstate 69. The ...

, United States. It is currently the tallest building in Texas and the South Central region of the United States, the tallest five-sided building in the world, the 29th-tallest building in the United States, and the 107th-tallest building in the world.

Overview

The tower was built between 1979 and 1981 as the Texas Commerce Tower. It was designed by noted architects I. M. Pei & Partners. Architect of Record was 3D/International Inc. In some early plans, the building reached up to 80 stories; however, the FAA expressed concerns that additional height was a risk for aircraft going into and out of nearby William P. Hobby Airport. Nonetheless, when it was completed, it was the sixth-tallest building in the United States and the eighth-tallest building in the world. The building was developed as part of a partnership between

Texas Commerce Bank The Texas Commerce Bank (officially Texas Commerce Bank N.A., with its parent bank holding company known as Texas Commerce Bancshares, Inc.) was a Texas-based bank acquired by Chemical Banking Corporation of New York in May 1987. The acquisiti ...

and

Khalid bin Mahfouz Khalid bin Mahfouz ( ar, خالد بن محفوظ; December 26, 1949 – August 16, 2009) was a Saudi Arabian billionaire, banker, businessman, investor and former chairman of the National Commercial Bank (NCB). Khalid is the son of Salem Bin Ma ...

. It was built on the site where the Uptown Theatre, demolished in 1965, once stood. Upon its completion, the building surpassed Aon Center in

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world ...

to become the tallest building in the United States west of the

Mississippi River The Mississippi River is the List of longest rivers of the United States (by main stem), second-longest river and chief river of the second-largest Drainage system (geomorphology), drainage system in North America, second only to the Hudson B ...

, a title it held until Los Angeles's Library Tower, now known as the

U.S. Bank Tower U.S. Bank Tower, known locally as the Library Tower and formerly as the First Interstate Bank World Center, is a skyscraper in downtown Los Angeles, California. It is, by structural height, the third-tallest building in California, the second ...

, was built in 1990. JPMorgan Chase Tower is connected to the

Houston Downtown Tunnel System The Houston tunnel system is a network of subterranean, climate-controlled, pedestrian walkways that links 95 full city blocks below Houston's downtown streets. It is approximately long. There are similar systems in Chicago, Dallas, Oklahoma Ci ...

. This system forms a network of subterranean, climate-controlled, pedestrian walkways that link twenty-five full city blocks. The lobby of JPMorgan Chase Tower has been designed to harmonize not only with the height of the structure but also with the portico of

Jones Hall The Jesse H. Jones Hall for the Performing Arts (commonly known as Jones Hall) is a performance venue in Houston, Texas, and the permanent home of the Houston Symphony Orchestra and Society for the Performing Arts. Jones Hall is also frequently r ...

, home of the Houston Symphony Orchestra, and which occupies the city block immediately to the west. For that reason, a five-story glass wall supported by a stainless steel space frame spans the entire 85-foot width of the front entrance, making the lobby area light and airy, and opening up the space to the plaza outside.. The Tower also includes of retail space. The

sky lobby A sky lobby is an intermediate interchange floor in a skyscraper where people can change from an express elevator that stops only at the sky lobby to a local elevator that stops at a subset of higher floors. When designing supertall buildings ...

observation deck is located on the 60th floor. The sky lobby acts as a transfer point for persons traveling to the upper (61–75) floors, but also as an observation deck for the building tenants. The sky lobby is now permanently closed to the public and is only accessible by tenants. In the large plaza area at the entrance of the building is a multi-colored sculpture entitled "Personage with Birds", which was designed by painter and sculptor

Joan Miró Joan Miró i Ferrà ( , , ; 20 April 1893 – 25 December 1983) was a Catalan painter, sculptor and ceramicist born in Barcelona. A museum dedicated to his work, the Fundació Joan Miró, was established in his native city of Barcelona ...

, and which was installed in the plaza in early 1982. While the tower's name reflects the bank

JPMorgan Chase JPMorgan Chase & Co. is an American multinational investment bank and financial services holding company headquartered in New York City and incorporated in Delaware. As of 2022, JPMorgan Chase is the largest bank in the United States, t ...

, the only space designated to Chase was a single branch office on the bottom floor until 2021. The tower is owned by Prime Asset Management and managed by its original owner,

Hines Interests Hines Interests Limited Partnership is a privately held company that invests in and develops real estate. The company has developed, redeveloped or acquired 1,450 properties, comprising over 485 million square feet. The company currently manage ...

Hurricane Ike

On September 13, 2008, many of the tower's windows were blown out as

Hurricane Ike Hurricane Ike () was a powerful tropical cyclone that swept through portions of the Greater Antilles and Northern America in September 2008, wreaking havoc on infrastructure and agriculture, particularly in Cuba and Texas. Ike took a sim ...

struck the city, leaving desks exposed, metal blinds hanging in twisted heaps, and smoky black glass covering the streets below. Police were forced to cordon off the area due to the amount of debris in the streets. At first, it was speculated that the glass came off the building due to impact from debris or due to high-speed winds in the confined spaces. However, flying glass debris must be entirely governed by drag and lift forces that overcome gravity for a considerable time period. Also, the high-wind-speed-in-confined-spaces theory is not entirely justified since the height of damage seen in the tower exceeded too significantly the height of the Chase Center parking garage next to the tower. This theory was proposed because an increase in wind speed produces a drop in external pressure. This drop in pressure at the side and leeward walls, combined with the normal, higher pressure inside the building would result in a force that could possibly overcome design pressures causing the window to separate. Other theories included those of ABS Consulting Engineers, who suggested that glazing damage may have been produced by "organized" vortices produced by the upwind Calpine Center and steady vortices between the Tower and the Chase Center parking garage. The NatHaz Modeling Laboratory at the

University of Notre Dame The University of Notre Dame du Lac, known simply as Notre Dame ( ) or ND, is a private Catholic research university in Notre Dame, Indiana, outside the city of South Bend. French priest Edward Sorin founded the school in 1842. The main c ...

is currently conducting an investigation of the flow field around the structure, modeling the tower and the immediate area surrounding it using

computational fluid dynamics Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) is a branch of fluid mechanics that uses numerical analysis and data structures to analyze and solve problems that involve fluid flows. Computers are used to perform the calculations required to simulate ...

(CFD). Preliminary findings suggest that the localized damage is the result of a confluence of multiple mechanisms arising from the arrangement of nearby buildings, critical flow directionality and the possible entrapment of debris within evolving flow structures.

Fictional Portrayals

* The building stood in for the headquarters of the fictional "Knox Oil & Gas Company" in the 1983 film '' Local Hero''. * The building stood in as the fictional location of Charles C. Foster's law office of in the 2009 film '' Mao's Last Dancer''.

Gallery

File:JPMorganChaseTowerEntranceHoustonTX.JPG, Entrance to the JPMorgan Chase Tower File:JPMorgan Chase Tower (Houston).jpg, JPMorgan Chase Tower on a January day. File:Chasetowerreflection.jpg, JPMorgan Chase Tower from the rear. File:Daniel2986.jpg, JPMorgan Chase Tower as viewed from ground level. File:Daniel2986 Observation Deck.jpg, View from the Sky Lobby facing south west Houston. Visible are the Wells Fargo Plaza (left) and

Williams Tower The Williams Tower (originally named the Transco Tower) is a 64-story, class A art deco office tower located in the Uptown District of Houston, Texas. The building was designed by New York-based John Burgee Architects with Philip Johnson in ...

in the far background File:Jpmorganchasetower.jpg, JP Morgan Chase Tower during a summer afternoon. File:JPMorgan Chase Tower with Houston Skyline.jpg, The building as seen from a parking lot north of

Minute Maid Park Minute Maid Park is a retractable roof stadium in Houston, Texas, United States. It opened in 2000 as the home ballpark of Major League Baseball's Houston Astros. It has a seating capacity of 41,168, which includes 5,197 club seats and 63 ...

. File:JPMorgan Chase Tower with Houston Skyline at night.jpg, Houston evening skyline from the same parking lot with J.P. Morgan Chase Tower on far right. File:Houston Morgan Chase Building Ike.jpg, Damage to the JP Morgan Chase Tower after Hurricane Ike.

References

External links