Metropolitan Life Building

The MetLife Building (also 200 Park Avenue and formerly the Pan Am Building) is a skyscraper at Park Avenue and 45th Street, north of Grand Central Terminal, in the Midtown Manhattan neighborhood of New York City, New York, U.S. Designed in the International style by Richard Roth, Walter Gropius, and Pietro Belluschi and completed in 1962, the MetLife Building is tall with 59 stories. It was advertised as the world's largest commercial office space by square footage at its opening, with of usable office space. , the MetLife Building remains one of the 100 tallest buildings in the United States.

The MetLife Building contains an elongated octagonal massing with the longer axis perpendicular to Park Avenue. The building sits atop two levels of railroad tracks leading into Grand Central Terminal. The facade is one of the first precast concrete exterior walls in a building in New York City. In the lobby is a pedestrian passage to Grand Central's Main Concourse, a lobby with artwork, and a parking garage at the building's base. A rooftop heliport operated in the 1960s and briefly in 1977. The MetLife Building's design has been widely criticized since it was proposed, largely due to its location next to Grand Central Terminal.

Proposals for a skyscraper to replace Grand Central Terminal were announced in 1954 to raise money for the New York Central Railroad and New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad, the financially struggling railroads that operated the terminal. Subsequently, plans were announced for what later became the MetLife Building, to be built behind the terminal rather than in place of it. Work on the project, initially known as Grand Central City, started in 1959 and the building was formally opened on March 7, 1963. At its opening, the building was named for Pan American World Airways, for which it served as headquarters. The Metropolitan Life Insurance Company (MetLife) bought the Pan Am Building in 1981 and used it as their headquarters before selling the building in 2005. The MetLife Building has been renovated several times, including in the mid-1980s, early 2000s, and late 2010s.

Site

The MetLife Building is at 200 Park Avenue, between the two roadways of the Park Avenue Viaduct to the west and east, in the Midtown Manhattan neighborhood of New York City, New York, U.S. The building faces the Helmsley Building across 45th Street to the north and Grand Central Terminal to the south. Other nearby buildings include One Vanderbilt and 335 Madison Avenue to the southwest; the Yale Club of New York City clubhouse to the west; The Roosevelt Hotel to the northwest; 450 Lexington Avenue to the east; and the Graybar Building to the southeast. The building is assigned its own ZIP Code—10166—and is one of 41 such buildings in Manhattan, .

In 1871, the New York Central Railroad built the Grand Central Depot, a ground-level depot at the intersection of Park Avenue and 42nd Street; it was succeeded in 1900 by Grand Central Station, also at ground level. The completion of Grand Central Terminal in 1913 resulted in the rapid development of the areas around Grand Central, which became known as Terminal City. The Grand Central Terminal complex included a six-story building for baggage handling just north of the main station building, on what is now the site of the MetLife Building. The baggage handling building was converted to an office building late in its history. The surrounding stretch of Park Avenue was developed with International Style skyscrapers during the 1950s and 1960s.

Architecture

Designed in the International style by Richard Roth, Walter Gropius, and Pietro Belluschi, the MetLife Building was developed by Erwin S. Wolfson and completed in 1963 as the Pan Am Building. It is tall with 59 stories, containing both commercial and office space. , the MetLife Building is the 42nd-tallest building in New York City and 88th-tallest in the United States.

The Diesel Construction Company was the general contractor for the building; at the time of construction, Wolfson had owned that company. Numerous other engineers and contractors were involved in the building's construction, including Hideo Sasaki as site planning consultant and landscape architect; Jaros, Baum & Bolles as MEP engineers; and James Ruderman as structural engineer. From the beginning, the building was intended for large firms, with in office floor area. In total, it has of gross floor area, according to The Skyscraper Center.

Form

The massing consists of a base and an octagonal tower. Contemporary sources describe the base as measuring nine stories tall, atop which rises 50 tower stories. However, the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat gives a conflicting measurement of 10 base stories and 49 tower stories. Exterior planted areas were planned for the sidewalks and above the roof of the base.

The tower stories' floor plates are designed in an elongated octagonal lozenge, with the longer axis running parallel to 45th Street. The north and south facades are divided into three broad segments, while the west and east facades are one segment each. The building's form may have been influenced by the 1961 Zoning Resolution, a major change to New York City zoning code that was proposed just before construction started. The massing is similar to Le Corbusier's unbuilt tower in Algiers, proposed between 1938 and 1942, as well as the nearly contemporary Pirelli Tower in Milan (completed in 1958). The architects intended for the octagonal shape and exterior curtain wall to reduce the building's perceived sense of scale.

Facade

The facade of the first two stories and mezzanines is clad with granite, aluminum, marble, and stainless steel with glass windows. On Depew Place, an alley running below the eastern leg of the Park Avenue Viaduct, fifteen loading docks were constructed for trucks to conduct deliveries and loading. On the Vanderbilt Avenue side, a marquee was installed over the entrance in the 1980s. The third through seventh stories are exclusively sheathed in granite, with window inserts. The eighth and ninth floors, which are slightly set back, are clad in aluminum.

The 10th through 59th stories of the MetLife Building contain one of the first precast concrete exterior walls in a building in New York City. The building includes about nine thousand light-tan precast concrete Mo-Sai panels, each of which surrounds a window measuring wide by high. The panels themselves measure wide by high and weigh . Each panel is coated with a quartz aggregate to give texture to the facade. Vertical concrete mullions project about from the facade, separating the panels on every story. Flat concrete spandrels separate the windows between stories. Though Walter Gropius had considered a precast concrete facade to be more solid than a glass curtain wall, this only made the building appear bulkier. Furthermore, the appearance of concrete degraded over time; this effect could be seen in structures such as the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum but was more pronounced on the MetLife Building's facade. During the building's construction, the manufacturer of the Mo-Sai panels declared bankruptcy, forcing Diesel Construction to buy out that company to prevent delays in construction.

The facade is recessed at the 21st and 46th stories, where there is mechanical space. These recesses create the impression of deep shadows. Both mechanical stories are surrounded by a colonnade of columns, which are spaced apart on centers. The precast concrete curtain wall is recessed behind the columns.

The MetLife Building originally bore "Pan Am" displays on its north and south facades and globe logos on the east and west facades. This was swapped with neon "MetLife" displays to the north and south in 1992. These displays were changed again in 2017, being replaced with LED letters to conserve energy. The Pan Am Building was the last tall tower erected in New York City before laws were enacted preventing corporate logos and names on the tops of buildings. Modern New York City building code prohibits logos from being more than above the curb or occupying over on a blockfront. The sign replacements had been permitted because the city government considered the new signs to be an "uninterrupted continuation of a use" that was allowed before the zoning laws were changed.

Structural features

200 Park Avenue was built atop two levels of railroad tracks underground, which feed directly into Grand Central Terminal. The substructure of the building uses foundational columns that extend into the track levels, descending some below street level into the underlying bedrock. The substructure includes more than 300 columns, each across and clad with of concrete. Ninety-nine columns were built specifically for the Pan Am Building; these columns were installed within several inches of existing steel members such as third rails, but had to be isolated from the other steel. The new columns weighed between . Approximately two hundred existing columns, which supported the former baggage building on the site, were reinforced. The work involved abridging the tops of many existing columns and installing horizontal beams weighing up to . A "triple decker sandwich" made of lead, asbestos, and sheet steel was installed under each level of tracks to provide insulation.

The superstructure was constructed similarly to bridge spans. To fabricate the floor slabs, builders used a process called composite action, in which concrete was bonded with structural steel panels to create a stronger structure. Steel panels were fabricated, rather than concrete floors, because steel panels were lighter and could be constructed regardless of unfavorable weather. Over of steel panels are used in the floor plates, each of which contains wire and cable ducts. A standard floor slab could handle loads of . The building's steel frame weighs over in total. The roof of the building contains NOAA Weather Radio Station KWO35, a National Weather Service radio station. Since 1990, there has also been a peregrine falcon nest on the building's roof.

Helipad

The initial plans for the Pan Am Building were altered in March 1961 to provide for a helipad on the east side of the roof. The helipad garnered controversy immediately after it was announced, and opponents of the plan cited noise and safety concerns. The heliport's opening required approval from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), the city government, and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. Lawyers for the building's owners applied for permission to operate the heliport in August 1963, and the New York City Planning Commission confirmed in early 1964 that the owners had sought a permit for the heliport. The New York City Board of Estimate gave final approval to the heliport in January 1965, and test flights began that March, amid continued opposition to the heliport.

Helicopter service started on December 22, 1965. The service was operated by New York Airways, which flew Vertol 107 helicopters from the rooftop helipad to Pan Am's terminal at John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK). There was a ticket office for the heliport at the base of the building. Passengers would check in at the ticket office, then take an express elevator to the 57th floor, an escalator to the heliport lounge, then another elevator to the roof. The flight to JFK lasted an average of six minutes and twenty seconds. The New York City government renewed the heliport's operating license in 1966, despite continued opposition to the heliport. For a short period starting in March 1967, the company also offered service to Teterboro Airport

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