First Canadian Place is a skyscraper in the Financial District of Toronto , Ontario , at the northwest corner of King and Bay streets, and serves as the global operational executive office of the Bank of Montreal.
At m ft , it is the tallest building in Canada , the 34th tallest building in North America , and the rd tallest in the world. The building is owned by Manulife Financial Corporation 50 per cent in addition to a private consortium of investors including CPP Investments. The building is managed by Brookfield Properties. The main building in the complex was intended to be known as "First Canadian Bank Tower. Wright Building. The site was the last of the corners at King and Bay to be redeveloped in the s and s, and a major bidding war began over the property.
The then-little-known firm of Olympia and York eventually obtained nearly the whole city block, but the election of reformist mayor David Crombie led to new rules banning skyscrapers. It took three years of lobbying before permission for First Canadian Place was granted. When completed, the building was nearly identical in appearance to Stone's Standard Oil Building in Chicago , Illinois ; [ 7 ] completed two years previous, the Chicago tower is of the same floor plan and clad in the same marble, [ 8 ] the only overtly visible difference being the vertical orientation of the windows, as opposed to the horizontal run of those on First Canadian Place.
First Canadian Place was the 6th tallest building in the world to structural top currently rd and the tallest building overall outside of Chicago and New York when completed in It was also the tallest building in the Commonwealth of Nations until the completion of the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur , Malaysia , in The roof is still the location of a number of antennas used for radio and television broadcasting.
The structure contains 29 elevators , and is one of only a few buildings in the world that uses the double-decked variety , and is connected to the underground PATH system. The album featured two photos which were taken from the same place but at different times by Muffins guitarist Mark Gane using a time-lapse camera and features the building at midday and dusk.
