The CN Tower was the world’s tallest freestanding structure from 1975 until 2007.
Construction of the Canadian telecommunications and observation tower began in 1973, and it opened to the public in 1976. Its name comes from Canadian National, the railway company whose properties helped inspire the project. The tower was built to improve television and radio broadcasting in Toronto, where tall buildings were causing signal problems.
The CN Tower rises 553.33 metres and remains one of Canada’s best-known landmarks. It lost the freestanding-height record to the Burj Khalifa in 2007, although the Burj Khalifa is a building rather than a communications tower. The tower’s main observation level includes the famous Glass Floor, which opened in 1994.
The CN Tower became a defining feature of Toronto’s skyline and was designated a national historic landmark of Canada in 1995.