High-Rise Commercial Office Buildings

Problem

The Empire State Building provides office space for about 500 tenant companies with a population of approximately 11,000 employee and staff and 4,500 business visitors per day. Also, each year, 3.5 million tourists are screened and ticketed for the 1,050 foot vertical ride to the 86th Floor Observatory – and some visit the 102nd Floor Observatory another 200 ft higher. In addition, there is approximately 50,000 sq.ft. of ground floor retail space accessible to the public from the street and to the building occupants from the lobby.

The problems we faced were the need to develop entry control and screening systems able to process large volumes of persons with different credentials, each cost-effectively and with minimum delay. Any solutions that we developed had to compliment the building lobby’s 1930s art deco design and be approved by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission.

Solution

Aggleton & Associates has worked closely with the Empire State Building management since February 2000 to analyze their security needs and develop practical and cost-effective solutions.

Our designs addressed each of the three major categories that require entry:

• Tenant Employees, with daily access needs, use traditional photo ID proximity cards at custom designed turnstiles controlling access to the lobby elevator banks
• Business Visitors, after being registered, verified and validated, are issued visitor badges with bar codes for one-time use at the same turnstiles
• Tourists are screened using airport-style magnetometers and package x-ray systems prior to travelling on dedicated elevators to the Observatory floors.

In addition to the entry control projects described above, we have developed and documented designs for the security command center and specified state-of-the-art video system for the lobby and observatory floors.