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fluffstravels t1_jdmyflx wrote

Dumb question probably but can someone explain to me how the weight of all the buildings doesn’t just crush down through the tunnels? It always astounds me this doesn’t happen ever and I’m always a little freaked out by the idea.

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OrpheusNYC t1_jdn1y2l wrote

Manhattan bedrock is very close to the surface and extremely strong. It’s why the island can support the architecture that it does.

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fluffstravels t1_jdn33v8 wrote

Right but like how strong - i hear bedrock all the time but it still seems really vague. Like is there a point where if it’s thinned out too much it’ll break?

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poppenweiler t1_jdn8yeq wrote

Take a look at the Manhattan skyline sometime. You'll find this bedrock under the tall buildings but not under the shorter ones. That one big reason why the tall buildings are where they are.

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ImJLu t1_jdnqirp wrote

> It has been widely believed that the depth to bedrock was the primary underlying reason for the clustering of skyscrapers in the Midtown and Financial District areas, and their absence over the intervening territory between these two areas.[150][151] However, research has shown that economic factors played a bigger part in the locations of these skyscrapers.[152][153][154]

From the Wikipedia article, sources are linked there

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poppenweiler t1_jdns55k wrote

Consider me factchecked.

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ImJLu t1_jdnukcc wrote

Lmao dw, I just happened to be reading the article (linked elsewhere in this thread) right before reading your comment lol

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Tall-Ad5755 t1_jecswka wrote

It makes more sense that the downtown was built. And then a less dense area to support that. And instead of replacing all that low density (and the best neighborhoods in hindsight) they just expanded above that area. Explains the age too; lower Manhattan is 400 years old while midtown started building up in the late 1800s.

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Tall-Ad5755 t1_jecsfpq wrote

It’s so poetic that a grand city was built on top of all that schist.

As if it was always meant to be.

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drmctesticles t1_jdop8ox wrote

They redid the foundations for the buildings above the caverns

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GeorgeMagnus t1_jdqd8ud wrote

looking uptown you will see a cut off, an area where the sky rises stop. This is because the bedrock ends. No skyscrapers in Harlem, for example.

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