Martin Tower, once Bethlehem Steel’s world headquarters, will vanish from Bethlehem’s skyline this year after a 47-year reign as the Lehigh Valley’s tallest building, a representative of its owners confirmed Monday.
The owners plan to demolish the 21-story, cruciform-shaped structure that once housed the elegant offices of Steel’s top executives, but has been vacant for a dozen years.
The developers have not yet determined whether the 332-foot building will be imploded or dismantled, Duane Wagner, director of development for HRP Management, said Monday on behalf of the owners.
Wagner’s comments mark the first time the owners, a partnership of investors Lewis Ronca and Norton Herrick, have revealed their intentions for the skyscraper since the 53-acre property, at 1170 Eighth Ave., was rezoned a little more than three years ago.
In a 2017 interview, Ronca said he wasn’t sure of the tower’s fate even as he began a more than $4 million project to remove the asbestos from it and demolish surrounding ancillary buildings.
“Over the past several years, even prior to the abatement process, we explored reuse internally and with several third-party groups, and were not able to create an economically viable plan for [its] reuse,” Wagner said.
Removing the tower opens for development the valuable property just off a Route 378 interchange. Wagner said the developers will submit a master plan for the site during the first quarter of this year.
The zoning allows for a mix of office, commercial and residential development.
Mayor Robert Donchez said the building proved over the years to be too inefficient to market. It’s better for the city as a whole, he said, to start fresh with tax-generating projects, rather than let the property continue to languish.
While some may mourn the tower’s loss, Donchez said, the city can take solace in saving older symbols of Bethlehem Steel: the Steel General Offices, where famed executives Eugene Grace and Charles Schwab ruled, and the blast furnaces.
“A certain number of people feel strongly about Martin Tower, but I think there is a stronger attachment to the blast furnaces, which really has become the skyline of Bethlehem,” Donchez said.
The tower amassed a fan base that aims to preserve it, at least visually. People routinely post both old and new photographs of it on the “Save Martin Tower” Facebook page. In recent years, a father and son made a miniature model of the glass-and-steel structure. Others posted drone footage on YouTube. Last year, one video showed a man appearing to BASE jump — a dangerous type of parachuting from a fixed structure — from Martin Tower.
The Martin Tower site, in the Lehigh County portion of Bethlehem, has been eyed for redevelopment since the final tenants moved out in 2007. The property was included in the 5-year-old City Revitalization and Improvement Zone, a tax incentive that allows developers to pay off construction loans with certain state and local taxes.
Demolition will prevent the use of federal tax credits developers once eyed when they successfully petitioned to get Martin Tower on the National Register of Historic Places. It was a noteworthy application because the building was younger than 50, yet preservationists agreed its ties to mighty Bethlehem Steel made it noteworthy.
Martin Tower opened in 1972 as a symbol of Steel’s power, eclipsing Allentown’s PPL Corp. building by 10 feet.
The tower was shaped in a cruciform to provide more corner offices for executives and featured original artwork, hand-woven carpets and wooden door knobs adorned with the Steel I-beam logo.
Its nominating form to the National Register called it an example of corporate culture’s “inward thinking” even as competitors, labor unrest and legacy costs loomed over the company, foreshadowing the “deindustrialization of America.”
“Martin Tower is the symbol of one of America’s mightiest industrial concerns as it plunged from the zenith of its power into a steady decline, ultimately leading to the failure that resulted in the loss of over 100,000 jobs and regional economic hardship,” according to the form prepared by Noble Preservation Services of Zionsville on behalf of the owners.
In its glory years, Bethlehem Steel employed 30,000 workers who created steel used in hundreds of World War II warships, the Golden Gate Bridge, the Empire State Building and other landmarks.
By the mid-20th century, the company amassed land in west Bethlehem and envisioned an office district. It first built a print shop and a smaller office building, and then added the tower.
Haines Lundberg Waehler Architects and George A. Fuller Construction Co. did the design and the construction work.
Bethlehem Steel declared bankruptcy under the onslaught of foreign steel competition in 2001. Its former south Bethlehem plant hosts a casino, restaurant, concert venues and business parks.
In 2006, Martin Tower landed in the hands of the company that now includes Ronca and Herrick.
There was little demand for the tower’s 600,000 square feet of office space. Its size and shape were unattractive to investors and its mechanical system was outdated. It was difficult to find a single occupant to fill the building, and its layout was inefficient.
Developers had first envisioned a $200 million residential community, but that faded when the residential market took a downturn. Those plans were shelved after the housing crash.
The property lingered until 2015, when city zoning was changed to make it easier for Martin Tower to be demolished and allowed a mix of office, commercial and residential development.
