With a little help from Jersey, One World Trade Center declared tallest in U.S.

At 1,776 feet, New York’s One World Trade Center is indeed the tallest building in the country, the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat announced today.

By Andrew George | Email | Twitter

At 1,776 feet, New York’s One World Trade Center is indeed the tallest building in the country, the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat announced today.

There had been some debate over whether the mast structure at the top of the building was a spire or an antenna, the latter of which would not have counted towards total height. Had the structure not been deemed an architectural feature of the building, measurement would have ended at the roof slab at 1,334 feet and once again given the Willis Tower in Chicago the claim to the country’s tallest.

“We were very satisfied with the detailed information presented by the team, in particular, that which affirmed that the structure on top of the building is meant as a permanent architectural feature, not a piece of functional-technical equipment,” CTBUH chairman Timothy Johnson said in today’s findings.

But New York’s new record doesn’t come without some of New Jersey’s labor. Hytorc, a Mahwah-based industrial bolting company, quite literally helped to put the building together as it was tasked with bolting down the 408-foot spire and its 14 communication rings.

Jason Junkers, Hytorc’s director of marketing, said today in a statement that the building’s official designation as the country’s tallest was an “exciting announcement” for the company.

“The Freedom Tower at One World Trade Center is such a significant project to our nation and we are proud to say that an international company, headquartered in Mahwah, New Jersey played an important role in making it the tallest skyscraper in the Western Hemisphere,” Junkers said.

One World Trade Center now becomes the third tallest building in the world, second only to the Burj Khalifa in Dubai and the Mecca Royal Clock Tower in Mecca, Saudi Arabia.

“The design of One World Trade Center, as explained to us, reinforces its role as a symbol of resurgence on this important site,” CTBUH executive director Antony Wood said today. “In particular, the spire which holds the beacon light, shining out at the symbolic height of 1,776 feet, is especially poignant—echoing the similarly symbolic beacon atop the Statue of Liberty across the water.”