A more senior representative of the Williams Tower’s property management office wrote in yesterday with a correction to Friday’s note about the recent return of the rotating spotlight at the top, after another employee told Swamplot that the beam had been off while a new bulb was being hunted down. In fact, the source tells Swamplot, the entire beacon fixture has been replaced, as part of a redo of the tip of the tower itself.
The current work on the top started in November 2014 and includes the replacement of the “apex roof” (consisting of the sloping panels directly beneath the beacon, and the vertical panels directly below those, above the start of the glass skin). The above photo shows those vertical panels missing late last spring as the swap was underway. The new spotlight turned on in late December, and final touches to the roof should be done by March, if the weather cooperates.
Here’s what the roof looked like back before the work began:
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- Previously on Swamplot: Why the Williams Tower Beacon Was Off Last Fall
Photos: Houston Streetwise (tower with scaffolding), Russell Hancock (tower before work)
Wow that was quite the roofing job. My palms get sweaty watching a shingle crew working on a 2-story house. This job must have had some fearless workers.
A little cosmetic work to the tip eh? Intactivists would be infuriated…
I wonder if they illuminated it with LED lighting how cool it would look?
I wonder if the property management companies downtown would illuminate the Houston skyline with LED lighting how cool it would look?
With Houston’s strong artistic community, it would be great to see a curated lighting of the skyline that’s different when you drive in from every angle.
As they stand in the dark every night, you can’t at all see the pyramid atop Heritage Plaza, the outlines of the “kissing” Pennzoil Place towers or hardly see the three tiers and spikes of Bank of America.
At night, the Energy Capital of the World’s skyline is hardly. . . yawn. . . energetic.
Yeah, light that sucker up, so you can see it at night! That would be awesome.
@JJ
Yep, just the tip. And you’re right , the inactivists are getting shafted. But that’s what you get when your politics skew left… even if its only slightly to the left. They should probably just relax, take a deep breath and take it all in. They’ll probably enjoy it after a while.