Thaindian News

Paris, April 1 (ANI): The Paris town council has been given permission to build a 590 feet controversial “Triangle” tower, which critics say is an “attack on the beauty of the French capital”.

The 40-storey steel and glass tower will be the first of its kind to be built inside Paris in more than 30 years, and will cost 535 million euros (472 million pounds), The Telegraph reports.

The privately financed building that is scheduled to be completed by 2017, would reportedly include offices, a conference hall, panoramic restaurants and ground-floor shops, creating 5,000 jobs according to local authorities.

Earlier this week, Paris’ cross-party council had approved a protocol agreement for the tower, but Greens and defenders of Paris’ heritage have opposed it.

The paper quoted Olivier de Rohan Chabot from the Safeguard of French Art group, as saying that he is not against towers in principle, but they ruined the skyline’s “general harmony” within central Paris.

“Look at the Montparnasse Tower; it has crushed the hotel des Invalides (housing Napoleon’s tomb). The monument was built to be grandiose. But what has it become? A dwarf. The tower ridicules it. In this sense, it’s a veritable attack on the beauty of the capital,” he said.

Co-architect Jacques Herzog, however brushed off concerns saying that the shape of the tower would rather “limit the shadow on neighbours”, and it would be highly ecological, using “wind and the sun to produce energy”. (ANI)