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Related to my post above, I feel like there's been a issue in the verifability of many "tallest buildings in (country/city)" articles that's been growing at least since 2022. From the early days of this Wikiproject up until now, the citations for buildings have primarily come from 3 sources: Emporis, SkyscraperCenter, and SkyscraperPage. With Emporis shutting down in 2022 and deleting all of its archival data (thanks a lot, CoStar), there was a major loss in reliable building and height data that was never fully recovered. SkyscraperCenter does not track buildings below 150 m well and for countries outside of North America or Europe, does not track buildings below 200 m well. SkyscraperPage (which should hopefully replicate all the data Emporis had lost one day) has a dated website and has lax sourcing for the heights in its database. Sometimes it cites Wikipedia, leading to circular referencing

I guess the problem is few people cares enough about the height of tall buildings outside of niche areas like this one. If an exact height was stated somewhere, like in a forum, I'm sure people can find the primary source of the height by looking through the documents provided by the developer or architect. In addition, if a city has 3D view on Google Earth, the heights of the buildings can be independently measured.

This Wikiproject also seems to lacks experienced editors who can weigh in on the situation; both the main page and this talk page have seen relatively few edits over the past 5 years and most sections are left without replies! In the past five years, less than five editors have added themselves in as participants. Why is interest in this Wikiproject so low?

So, what should we do about this, if anything? LivinAWestLife (talk) 03:48, 15 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think there is a reliability crisis about the sources used. I think the reliability crisis is which articles have active editors. Articles that are up to date typically have a variety of sources, typically from news articles. On the other hand, there are still a lot of articles that do not get much attention.

I can speak of an example from the highly active articles - I edit most of the articles in Category:Lists of tallest buildings in New Jersey, and almost all of the articles have highly active editors. For example, List of tallest buildings in Newark's 100th most recent edit dates back to February 18 2025. There are highly active users on NJ articles such as User:Djflem and User:Gamezilla2019, as well as lots of random users who edit due to high-construction activity of the state. Its often easy to find information for new projects in NJ, I find the most reliable to be websites like https://jerseydigs.com/, https://newyorkyimby.com/, and https://patch.com/ (works nationwide). Rarely have I had to find architectural plans on a municipal website to find specific details. I don't think there is a reliability crisis regarding sourcing. Relying on the three traditional websites isn't necessary, although https://www.ctbuh.org/ is still generally useful.

On the other hand, I have often come across articles for cities that have gotten less than 100 edits in the last 5 years, such as List of tallest buildings in Houston. Some of these articles need lots of updating. So the traditional websites still have usefulness for bringing these older articles up to date. And like NJ, there is probably reliable local news sources for these things (like Patch), the problem is whether the articles have active editors. The problem gets far worse on international articles, especially countries with low numbers of English speakers or Wikipedia users. Just look at the mess that is articles regarding buildings in East Asia, the Middle East, or Africa.

On your point about the nicheness of this topic, I think there has been an uptick in activity over the last few years. I started editing these kinds of articles in 2019, and many of these pages were only semi-active at best. I noticed over the last few years that the frequency of editors has been rising in many articles, especially compared to when you look at pre-2022. Additionally, (at least in the US), there has been an uptick in development activity as cities are densifying their downtowns, fueling further interest in these kind of articles.

So, the solution is to start editing articles that have had little activity over the last few years, there is often plenty to update to maintain conformity across articles. Hij802 (talk) 05:33, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

That's kind of what I've been trying to do now. So many tall building articles just don't receive a lot of attention (inexplicably, imo) from editors, including from people who live in that city. I actually created a spreadsheet to track all of the tall building articles for each city - there are 390 of them. All the ones outside of North America need some serious help. Of course, that brings me back to a related point, which is that we don't have enough people/editors who care that much about tall buildings. Would be easier for me if there were! LivinAWestLife (talk) 20:06, 5 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Per consensus in the talk page, the guideline for the number of skyscrapers for each city in List of cities with the most skyscrapers has been changed to not rely solely on CTBUH. Any alternative number must be backed up by other sources. If you have any concerns or objections please voice them here or over on the article's talk page. LivinAWestLife (talk) 03:33, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

For tallest buildings articles I think it would be easiest if we only include completed buildings in the main list, instead of topped out buildings that are really still under construction. Not sure if it was always standard to include them in the mian list but there's definitely been an uptick in the past few years, but its inconsistent application across Wikipedia has been quite frustrating. It would also make counting skyscrapers easier as well as cross-referencing with other sources like SkyscraperCenter or SkyscraperPage. LivinAWestLife (talk) 03:43, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Buildings that have been topped out but not officially opened/completed are still includes on lists for practical purposes. I do see the inconsistency between articles, but that mostly stems from articles that are hardly updated. Articles like List of tallest buildings in New York City that are updated frequently typically include them, while articles that do not get as much attention like List of tallest buildings in Dallas seem to fall behind. If the general consensus for people who are actively editing articles over the last few years are including topped off buildings, then thats probably the current consensus, and we should adjust older articles accordingly. Hij802 (talk) 04:29, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Alright, noted. I’ll generally include them if it is well known that the structure is topped out. However there is no need to highlight them in green especially as one IP address editor has tried to do, since that shade of green is also very close to the color we use to indicate former tallest buildings.

also I should kindly mention you messed up the ranking in New York’s tallest buildings list lol (which is why I prefer not to use the row numbers template for tables myself) LivinAWestLife (talk) 10:52, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Buildings that have been structurally topped out are among the tallest in any given city. Whether or not they've been completed for habitation is another issue and whether articles have been updated is another issue as well. Djflem (talk) 07:43, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Just want to let you know that I've accepted this viewpoint, cheers :) LivinAWestLife (talk) 13:25, 10 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I have nominated List of tallest buildings in Tampa for featured list removal. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets the featured list criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks; editors may declare to "Keep" or "Delist" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Cyrobyte (talk) 23:45, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

There have been plenty of tall buildings lists made for cities that Wikipedians have deemed to fail notability guidelines, and have since been deleted. There are also a few cities (in my opinion) which should have a tall building list, but currently lack one. I think having a notability guideline would clarify if such a list passes or fails WP:NLIST.

I think these are reasonable:

A city fulfilling any one of these criteria is generally sufficient to automatically confer notability for its tallest buildings list:

• Having at least 30 skyscrapers taller than 150 m (492 ft)
• Having an urban area or metro area population of over 5 million
• Being the largest city in a country with a population of over 5 million
• Having individual articles for at least five of the buildings on the list

Otherwise, the following factors are enough to make the list notable:

• Having individual articles for at least three of the buildings on the list
• Significant coverage of the topic of a city's skyscrapers, its skyline, or its tallest buildings in multiple independent sources
• Significant coverage of a city's high-rise development, or of separate high-rise buildings and projects, in multiple independent sources.

And I would say these are necessary conditions for notability:

• The city's tallest building must be at least 50 meters (164 ft) high.
• At least ten entries on the list.
• A picture of the skyline.

Other notes:

• Lists for entire countries are assumed to be notable
• Lists for continents are assumed to be notable
• Lists for certain regions should come under much scrutiny; List of tallest buildings in the Balkans was deleted but List of tallest buildings in the European Union was kept.
• Lists for neighbourhoods and areas are also generally not notable, unless the topic of tall buildings in those areas have received significant coverage. There are currently five articles about sub-municipal regions. Each of these, with the exception of Staten Island, has a notable cluster or 'skyline' of tall buildings separate from the main skyscraper cluster(s) of these cities.
  • List of tallest buildings in Brooklyn
  • List of tallest buildings in Chatswood
  • List of tallest buildings and structures in Croydon
  • List of tallest buildings in Parramatta
  • List of tallest buildings in Queens
  • List of tallest buildings in Staten Island
• Lists for urban areas metropolitan areas generally are not needed unless a significant proportion of tall buildings are located outside of the city limits of the metropolitan area's main city. For example, there are pages for Greater Taipei, Metro Manila, the Washington metropolitan area, and Greater Paris, as their tallest skyscrapers are spread across different municipalities (For that reason, I would support having a page for Greater Vancouver or Gush Dan). By contrast, there is no separate page for the New York metropolitan area, as the skyscrapers in Jersey City make up less than 10% of the number of skyscrapers in New York City.

LivinAWestLife (talk) 14:46, 10 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

If there is no opposition in this for a month I'll take it as consensus to introduce the notability guidelines to the WikiProject page. LivinAWestLife (talk) 17:00, 10 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

That is not how consensus works on Wikipedia, per WP:DCON. A lack of participation means the status quo remains until another discussion is held, not an implicit agreement to implement those changes. SounderBruce 20:52, 10 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I see. I wish more people would participate in this Wikiproject in any case. LivinAWestLife (talk) 23:37, 10 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

"Assumed notable" is not the phrasing that should be used; the primary indicator of notability should be a simple link to WP:GNG, which is ultimately the only real policy that we can point to for skyscraper lists. Much of this reads as a precedents list rather than a project-level notability guide, so it should be separated out rather than mashed together. SounderBruce 20:52, 10 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Many categories of articles and objects have notability guidelines established that go beyond what is listed at WP:GNG even as it remains the primary guideline for notability. What do you mean by separating out? LivinAWestLife (talk) 23:39, 10 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

There is a requested move discussion at Talk:John Hancock Tower#Requested move 14 August 2025 that may be of interest to members of this WikiProject. Jeffrey34555 (talk) 19:33, 21 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

A request for comment has been opened regarding the inclusion of proposed buildings on "List of tallest buildings" articles for a city. Please participate here if you wish. LivinAWestLife (talk) 22:30, 6 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

There is a requested move discussion at Talk:List of tallest buildings and structures in the Birmingham Metropolitan Area, West Midlands#Requested move 2 October 2025 that may be of interest to members of this WikiProject. WhatADrag07 (talk) 20:00, 14 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Please see List of tallest buildings in Detroit as it is up for review. Mattximus (talk) 16:22, 1 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]