Skyscrapers and Skylines: New York and Chicago, 1885–2007

Abstract

This paper investigates skyscraper competition between New York City and Chicago. The urban economics literature is generally silent on strategic interaction between cities, yet skyscraper rivalry between these cities is a part of U.S. historiography. This paper tests whether there is, in fact, strategic interaction across cities. First, I find that each city has positive reaction functions with respect to the other city, suggesting strategic complementarity. In regard to zoning, I find that height regulations negatively impacted each city, but produced positive responses by the other city, providing evidence for strategic substitutability.

Differentiated effect of advertising: Joint vs. separate consumption

“…Certainly, today's territorial competition to attract visitors is so fierce that marketing activities play a critical role in regional policies (Hamoudi & Riseno, 2012;Barr, 2013). With the bottom-up approach, in which specific places within countries develop their own strategies to accomplish their own goals and implement their own promotional actions -rather than the countries themselves under the topdown approach- (Chien & Gordon, 2008), it is justified the existing plethora of entities, both public and private, conducting myriads of actions in order to enhance their competitiveness.…”

Rent Premiums and Vertical Sorting in Amsterdam’s Multi-Tenant Office Buildings

“…The work of Barr (2010Barr ( , 2012Barr ( , 2013 on the economic determinants of building height stands somehow at the intersection of these two theories. The author finds that skyscraper height is primarily determined by local and national economies, land use regulations and taxation (Barr 2010).…”

“…Additionally, economic factors and land use regulation were important determinants of building height. In a comparative study of building height determinants for the cities of Chicago and New York, Barr (2013) finds that general economic and policy variables are mainly responsible for the variation in height between the cities. However, each city responded differently demonstrating that local factors have an important influence on building height.…”

Skyscraper Indicator and its Application in the UK

“…Easily available capital triggers skyscraper construction with its completion during the economic contraction. This Lawrence's idea has been extended with the most notable contributions by Thornton (2005), Barr (2010a;2010b;2013), Barr et al (2015) and a series of articles published by the Economist (2006;2015a;2015b). Thornton (2005) interpreted the Skyscraper Indicator in the light of 'Cantillon effect' and Austrian school's theory of the business cycle.…”

“…In Barr (2013), the author compared the determinants of the market for skyscrapers in Chicago and New York over the 1885-2007 period. The dependent variables were the number of skyscraper completions and the height of the tallest building completed each year in the cities.…”