Talk:Tower block/Archive 1

Archive 1

Archive 2

Cleanup

A brief explanation of why I added the cleanup tag, the prose is disjointed and uncited. - FrancisTyers 11:54, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

Not to mention, it contains cut-and-copied paragraph from external source (it contains nonexistent references). Pavel Vozenilek 17:00, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

I tried to assess if this was a copyvio by doing the normal test - put a whole sentence or large fragments into google - but I couldn't find anything. Perhaps it was copied out of a book? I wouldn't be against removing it, or paraphrasing it at least, it certainly has some interesting stuff to say. - FrancisTyers 23:40, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Commieblock?

Is that real? It sounds too good to be true... 68.39.174.238 03:25, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

See discussion on Talk:Commieblock. It would be better to add some of the information here since it is new neologism. Pavel Vozenilek 17:56, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

I really don't think we need a neologism from a web forum. Secretlondon 21:07, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Removed

This is uncited and doesn't fit into the scheme, feel free to revert me. - FrancisTyers · 12:32, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Former communist countries

Tower blocks were utilised by socialist governments to provide affordable housing for its citizens. Most of them are in countries like Russia, China and North Korea, and provide the bulk of public housing. Modern, well maintained tower blocks are very clean, comfortable and prove to be excellent housing type with many advantages over urban sprawl.

Such housing plans become popular during the presidency of Nikita Khrushchev in USSR.

Merge and rename

I'd suggest we merge Plattenbau, Panelák, and any similar articles into this one; it needs improvement, and the subject of high-density housing built to standard designs is one that affects many countries. I'd prefer a title such as "Apartment block" to "Tower block," as the latter is somewahat UK-centric and, more importantly, most such buildings are not towers. They are also not always prefabricated, hence I'd suggest avoid using that term in the title as well.  ProhibitOnions  ^(T) 11:48, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

How about "High-density housing"? — although other types of housing can also be described as "high density" "Apartment block" is certainly not an improvement over "Tower block". And it isn't only UK centric, "Tower block" is certainly used in the Republic of Ireland, you could say that it is "European anglophone centric", but I'm not sure if that is true either ;) - FrancisTyers · 12:00, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

From the Oxford English Dictionary:

• tower block, a tall block of flats, a high-rise building, a skyscraper;
• apartment house, a building divided into residential suites of rooms (chiefly N. Amer.); so apartment block, building, hotel.

From dictionary.com:

• tower block: tower consisting of a multistoried building of offices or apartments; "`tower block' is the British term for `high-rise'"
• apartment house: A building comprising a number of suites designed for separate housekeeping tenements, but having conveniences, such as heat, light, elevator service, etc., furnished in common; -- often distinguished in the United States from a flat house.

Of course none of these is really better than the other. I think the article should focus on the 50s-80s designs that were found in most countries — the stereotypical "grim tower block" designs. This distinguishes them from other kinds of apartment buildings. - FrancisTyers · 12:15, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Thinking about it "High-rise residential accommodation" would be a reasonable compromise (against Tower block or Apartment block), and accurate. - FrancisTyers · 12:21, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

I oppose any merger into this article. This article should focus on the specific style of apartment building, with one central staircase. and a minimum of 15 stories. The issue of prefabrication (Plattenbau) is a separate issue and should be coverend in separate articles along with affordable housing. The thing that unites tower blocks throughout the world, (and at the same time differentiates them from true skyscrapers) is the use of pre-stressed concrete, not prefabrication. As an example, the residental buildings in South Beirut, destroyed by the Israel Defense Forces last week, are most likely "tower blocks", but it is unlikely that they use any prefabricated parts.

Most prefabricated buildings in Europe (maybe not the UK) share a design very different from the tower block. A Finnish: lamellitalo shares the design of a rowhouse in having multiple similar units attached to each other in a row. However every "module", instead of housing a single home, contains multiple apartments centerd around a single stairway. The hight of the building is 5 to 7, or even 9 floors if the stairwell has an elevator, 3 to 4 if not.

-- Petri Krohn 23:56, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

The common element is multiple-dwelling housing, several storeys high (but not always "high-rise") built to a standard design, typically in response to an urgent need for new housing. The implementation was different from country to country, but the general idea wasn't. East German Plattenbau construction could be built to many different heights, and were thus not always towers, but the apartments themselves were the same, depending on which design they were. Poland, for example, has similar endless high-rise housing estates, but very few of these are prefabricated, although there are only a few standard designs.  ProhibitOnions  ^(T) 15:02, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia is missing the main article on prefabricated concrete apartment buildings. Prefabricated housing can not be expanded to fill this void, as there are many others methods of prefabrication. This article can not serve the purpose either, as this article is needed to cover true towerblocks. You could start by merging Plattenbau and Panelák, if you can find a suitable title. -- Petri Krohn 02:43, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

P.S. I started an article on hollow core slabs, an element vital in constructing the apartment buildings. We still need an article on Sandwich elements -- Petri Krohn 02:43, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, but again, such apartments are not always prefabricated, just built to a standard design. However, an article about prefabrication itself is a good thing. But then we have one more article to decide what to do with...  ProhibitOnions  ^(T) 09:00, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

In the Article Panelák it says "blocks of high-rise flats" this is not at all true for all buildings build in the Plattenbau technique. See Bernau bei Berlin or Nikolaiviertel for better known examples of smaller scaled Plattenbau buildings. The Czech word Panelák may describe a subgroup of the german term Plattenbau but I even doubt that.--T.woelk 01:51, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

I am concerned about the context of this entry as a discussion on international differences on a broad level instead of the purpose of my search that brought me here which was to get an understanding of the meaning of a specific apartment block building type. This should be broken down into specific definitions of apartment block types after each regional type is listed, providing each region with a more focused item. Rothwyn 16:54, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Eastern Europe

I removed the statement here in it's entirety as I could not believe that such a ridiculous pov statement was present in an encyclopaedia. I have no information on this, perhaps someone who does could complete a respectable entry. --Brideshead 21:11, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

Split tower block

This is a proposal to have Tower block specifically refer to British high-rises, and remove the remaining countries to a generic article (name to be determined). This main article would then have links to British tower block, German Plattenbau, Czech Panelak, North American public housing, etc.

This suggestion is related to the discussion called "Merge and Rename" above. Part of the problem is deciding if these all fall into the same category because they're (1) prefabricated, (2) high-density, (3) government-funded, (4) built at the same time (1950-80's), (5) have a certain number of stories or some combination of the above. Tocharianne 20:16, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

I feel it will be more appropriate to create subarticles as opposed to completely splitting it. The paragraphs for the United States and Britain would be more of a summary and then there would be the main article link at the top of the sections to Tower block (Britain) etc. I would only do this to those sections that can be moved into sizeable articles. I can add a lot of information for the British tower blocks article if this split does take place. - Erebus555 16:26, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

Other places?

Hm... It looks like this article does not take much places in mind ... basically it is the UK, US and Asia ... where is the rest of the world?? At least I would go for other areas, like Mexico City (which has some very large tower blocks, including the famous Nonoalco-Tlatelolco complex. (I might even add some info if I have some spare time) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 148.244.43.169 (talk • contribs) 02:59, 3 January 2007

Image:Crossways_Estate.jpg

Does anyone know whether these blocks are going to be demolished or refurbished? thanks.

--Marianian (talk) 19:04, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I think the plan is to refurbish them. The low-rise buildings on the estate look set to be demolished and replaced.[1] - Erebus555 (talk) 15:26, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Assertions about density

The second paragraph seems to assert a number of things for which I have seen evidence to the contrary.

It says that apartment blocks accommodate more inhabitants per unit of area of land than low-rise. That isn't necessarily so. Many of the most densily populated areas in Europe (Paris, Barcelona, Berlin) and North America (Georgetown in DC, Plateau Mont-Royal in Montreal) are nothing but low-rise. Many apartment blocks are on a large lot or surrounded by surface parking, which brings down the ratio of inhabitants per area, particularly because the household size tends to be low. And while there is a correlation between the cost of municipal infrastructure and density at the low to middle end of the density scale, I'm not sure this is true for apartment blocks. Any references for this?

It talks about technical and economic advantages for high population density, but I think the actual trigger is land value, not a requirement for density.

I'm not sure what is meant by "distinguished form of housing accommodation". Tono-bungay (talk) 05:45, 27 February 2009 (UTC)