Builds 13: My What a Big Tower You Have

All the better to see you with my dear.

Okay, really just built it to see how big it would be in Second Life. Thanks to a few huge prims (40 meters each) it is only 49 prims so far. Given the odd angles it wouldn't be possible with smaller prims due to round error issues coupled with maximum link distances.

Even so I couldn't get the corners to match right, especially since that would require tapering in three dimensions instead of two, not something supported by the Lindens as of yet. And for some reason when I tapered the prims, they shrank by one centimeter in height, reducing them to 3999cm and meaning I had to juggle with the ones that were still a full 40 meters. The problem is that the base is a four point star and not a square. Those corners are canted out at 26 degrees in one direction and 1.25 degrees in another. So there is corner overlap on the ends. Well, better than pixel panic I suppose.

It is a real tower, called the Shimonoseki Kaikyo Yume Tower and can be found in Shimonoseki, Japan (山口県下関市).

My version is still very much a draft and likely to stay that way unless I get really inspired. The problem is, where would I put it? Anyone want a reproduction of a 150 meter tall tower with almost no usuable interior space?

The interior of the original is all support structure for the ball at the top, which houses two observation decks (the lower one being a museum with historical information of what you are looking at), a gift shop and a small restuarant. The elevator runs up one of the legs. One of the others houses emergency stairs.

Although it says 153 meters in the overview, it is not clear whether that includes the hill and the platform it sits on, since it is a three storey climb just to the front door, past a conference center and performance space.

It is one of the three Japanese tower stamps (and keychains) that I have to my name. The second is Kyoto tower, and the third is from Osaka. Gotta catch 'em all!