The Eiffel Tower is 1,063 feet tall from base to tip. The Empire State Building stands 1,250 feet tall (1,454 ft if you include the antenna). So which is taller? They're equal in height.
The Eiffel Tower was built as a monument to France's industrial prowess and as a display of French engineering. The Empire State Building was designed by American architects who were inspired by the European skyscrapers they saw during their visit to New York City in 1931. So they wanted something unique that would stand out in a city full of tall buildings. They succeeded with this design that is now regarded as one of the world's most influential architectural feats.
Not only are these two structures equally impressive but also very different from each other. The Eiffel Tower is a single structure made up of wrought iron and glass, while the Empire State Building is a collection of concrete and steel beams inside a hollow shell of glass. Also, the Eiffel Tower is rigid where as the Empire State Building is flexible. This means that it can bend without breaking like the Eiffel Tower but will still be standing after being hit by lightning three times like the Empire State Building.
They both use elevators to travel between the ground floor and the rooftop.
The Eiffel Tower stands 1,063 feet (324 meters) tall, including the top antenna. It is 984 feet without the antenna (300 m). It was the highest tower in the world until the Chrysler Building in New York was finished in 1930. The Eiffel Tower is still the second-highest structure in Paris (behind the Tour de France), and it is the most popular tourist attraction in France.
In 1955, the original antenna was replaced by a new one that is 244 feet high. The old antenna was donated to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.
The cost of building the Eiffel Tower was 3 million francs (about $60 million in 1955). Its height made it ideal for broadcasting news around Europe. The first radio broadcast from the tower was made on July 14, 1919.
News reports at the time described the event as a "radio speech" by French President Louis Armand Jaures or a "music performance by some musicians from Paris". In fact, it was an interview with American economist John Maynard Keynes conducted by French journalist Pierre Le Hir for the Radiodiffusion-Télévision française (RTF) news service. The program was heard by millions of people throughout Europe.
The Eiffel Tower towers over the Statue of Liberty. The Eiffel Tower is today 1,063 feet tall, yet it was only 1,024 feet when it was built. That's 12 feet shorter than today's Statue of Liberty.
The weight of the Eiffel Tower is estimated to be about 7,700 pounds. The weight of the Statue of Liberty is estimated to be about 7,300 pounds.
The height of the Eiffel Tower makes it feel lighter than it actually is while the height of the Statue of Liberty makes it feel heavier than it actually is. This is because both structures use levers to create what are called "dead weights". A dead weight is any object that doesn't affect the stability of a structure but still has mass so that it can be used as leverage. For example, if you were to take away the base of a table lamp, its head would rise up higher than the rest of the lamp body. You could then use this raised head as a lever against your hand to lift the lamp off the ground. This is how many tables and chairs exist. Without the base to hold them down, they would fall over.
The Eiffel Tower uses its dead weight at the top as leverage against the earth's gravity to keep itself upright.
The Empire State Building is higher than the Statue of Liberty, which is higher than the Eiffel Tower. As a result, the Empire State Building towers over the Eiffel Tower. The highest structure is the Empire State Building, followed by the Statue of Liberty and, finally, the Eiffel Tower. The diameter of the Empire State Building's base is equal to that of its upper part.
In New York City, the statue stands on Liberty Island in Upper New York Bay. It is an American monument to freedom and democracy, designed by Frédéric-Auguste Cadet with sculptor Jean-Antoine Houdon. The statue was built at a cost of $7 million (equivalent to $100 million in 2017) and opened to the public on October 28, 1884.
It is 71 feet high, including the torch; it weighs 5,000 pounds. The pedestal is about 48 feet high. At its opening, it was the world's tallest statue as well as its most expensive piece of sculpture. Today, it is ranked third behind the Metrocity Center in Moscow and the Burj Khalifa in Dubai. The statue's arms are held out wide, showing two hands holding a light bulb within a circle. On one arm is an apple to represent peace and liberty; on the other, a torch to show progress through knowledge.
The tower was intended by Eiffel to be 300 meters high, or 984 feet (about 90 storeys); it is 328 feet wide at its base. This dimension tapers fast, as seen in the picture and table below. The elevator inside the tower can carry 50 people at a time.
Its actual height is 463 feet (137 m), with an additional 36 feet (11 m) of steel added after construction for stability reasons. It is the tallest free-standing structure in Europe, as well as the third tallest building in the world after the Burj Khalifa and Shanghai World Financial Center.
The top of the tower is a public viewing platform accessible by elevator, with excellent views over Paris. Visitors can spend about an hour up there without worrying about energy costs or phone signals.
In addition to being a major tourist attraction, the Eiffel Tower plays an important role in keeping Paris warm during cold winters. Heated from within by electricity, the tower acts as a giant radiator, helping to keep the city dry despite its proximity to water. If it got too hot inside the tower, like something out of a science fiction movie, you would die. But that has never happened.
You can see both the ground and the sky through the windows of the first floor gallery.
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