A road runs through it:

[mia]

Resourceful Japanese engineers did not let a small matter like a lack of space deter them when they needed to begin a new construction project and managed to build a road through an office block in the city of Osaka.... The highway is the tenant of those floors and actually pays rent....The motorway does not make contact with the building and it passes through as a bridge, held up by supports next to the building.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2093903/No-room-road-Japanese-engineers-just-build-straight-middle.html#ixzz1kzJYvPl4

[tabatha]

1. I wonder what the noise and vibration are like.

[Ikonoklast]

3. I dunno, but sounds like the end to a good date.

[mia]

5. "Architects surrounded the road with a structure to protect the building from noise and vibration. "

Must be an interesting view from those windows that nearly face the oncoming cars.

[Art_from_Ark]

15. According to this article in Japanese Wiki,

the "windows" on the 5th through 7th floors are "dummy windows" and no one is actually in any of those floors

http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/ゲートタワービル.

The "highway" that goes through the building is actually a one-lane exit from Expressway #11

[Shankapotomus]

2. That is freaking awesome!

[HopeHoops]

4. Clever, but I wouldn't want to work on the floors above, below, or beside it.

I lived near a railroad track (like right next to it) for a while. I've been in hotels right next to highways. They can be loud.

[RC]

6. The road does not touch the building.

Also the road through the building is covered to contain the sound. I'm betting road noise cannot be heard inside the building. These are innovative Japanese after all, not cut cost at any cost American capitalist.

[HopeHoops]

7. The railroad didn't touch my apartment building either, but it was fucking loud.

[A HERETIC I AM]

8. That's because the rail road and your apartment building shared something ...

Contact with the ground

[HopeHoops]

9. Well, technically so does the "non-touching" roadway and the building, BUT!!!

Sound transcends that barrier. It can set up harmonics that are far worse than physical connection. I trust they did what they could to minimize it, but I still wouldn't want to work on those three floors.

[RC]

10. Japan is earthquake prone.

So they build earthquake resistant structures. The building is most likely built on a rubber base. The road is also. Whatever, that also helps to isolate sounds and vibrations.

http://sfluxe.com/2012/01/12/japan-builders-tout-quake-resistant-features-bloomberg/
"Tokyo’s stringent building code, which includes rubber bearings used as foundation so that seismic energy can shift from structures, helped the city’s buildings avoid major damage from the nation’s record magnitude-9 quake, though the temblor turned landfill in the Tokyo Bay area into mud, shattering pipes and disrupting gas, electricity and water supplies."

[Art_from_Ark]

14. The road is actually in Osaka, not Tokyo

If the building were built prior to 1995, the regulations for seismic resistance probably would not have been as stringent in Osaka, since the area had been considered relatively safe from a major earthquake. However, in the aftermath of the January 1995 Hyogo-ken Nambu (Kobe) earthquake, a lot of effort was put into strengthening the building codes in the Osaka-Kobe area.

[BumRushDaShow]

11. Boston almost looked like that until they took the highways out

[Texasgal]

12. I couldn't do that.

I need trees and grass.

That living situation would make me incredibly sad.

Cool photo though.

[Found in Yonkers]

13. If corporations can be people, then roads can be tenants

[DCKit]

16. Good luck taking one to court for non-payment of rent.

Damn loopholes.

[Found in Yonkers]

17. Loopholes? No:

Potholes!

[pinboy3niner]

18. Q: How do you know when they're fixing the potholes?

A: From the "Construction Zen" signs.

Welcome to DU, Found in Yonkers.