Sydney Tower (GPS: -33.87031, 151.20888) is the tallest free-standing tower in Sydney and the second tallest building in Australia, after the Q1 building on the Gold Coast. It is also called the AMP Tower, AMP Centrepoint Tower, Centrepoint Tower or just Centrepoint. As of August 2022, Sydney Tower is still the second tallest observation tower in the Southern Hemisphere, after the Sky Tower of Auckland, New Zealand. However, the main observation deck of Sydney Tower is actually 50 metres higher than that of Auckland's Sky Tower.
Sydney Tower stands 305 metres above the Sydney Central Business District. It is located at 100 Market Street, between Pitt and Castlereagh Streets. It is accessible from the Pitt Street Mall, and sits upon Centrepoint an office building and shopping centre. Construction of Centrepoint began in 1970 while the Sydney Tower itself was constructed in 1975. When it opened in 1981, it was the fourth tallest building in the world. The total construction cost of the tower was A$36 million.
Before the construction of Sydney Tower, there was a height limit for buildings in Sydney at 279 metres. This is to allow safe overflights by flying boats. However, this type of aircraft has already been obsolete for two decades.
The three main sections of Sydney Tower open to the publilc are the Observation Deck, the Sydney Tower Skywalk and the restaurants. One is the Observation Deck, at 250 metres above ground level. This is where you find a small gift shop, and information about the tower. Above it is the Sydney Tower Skywalk. At 268 metres above ground level, it is only accessible through guided tours. There are two revolving restaurants, one serving à la carte and another buffet. The restaurants seat 220 people while the tower itself can accommodate up to 960 people at one time. Three high speed double-decker elevators whiz passengers to the Observation Deck within 40 seconds.
Dear visitor, thank you so much for reading this page. My name is Timothy Tye and my hobby is to find out about places, write about them and share the information with you on this website. I have been writing this site since 5 January 2003. Originally (from 2003 until 2009, the site was called AsiaExplorers. I changed the name to Penang Travel Tips in 2009, even though I describe more than just Penang but everywhere I go (I often need to tell people that "Penang Travel Tips" is not just information about Penang, but information written in Penang), especially places in Malaysia and Singapore, and in all the years since 2003, I have described over 20,000 places.
While I try my best to provide you information as accurate as I can get it to be, I do apologize for any errors and for outdated information which I am unaware. Nevertheless, I hope that what I have described here will be useful to you.