The Elphi could be seen as of corruption, since the whole project was initially advertised at costing the city about a hundred and something millions, the rest to be raised by private donations, 30 to 40 million initially IIRC.

Now the town basically has subsidized a hotel, a few luxury condos, some gastronomy, and got a few classic music venues which it could have gotten otherwise, and cheaper. Besides that it already had those before.

Furthermore I don't see the need to fake the look of this

[1] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaispeicher_A#/media/Datei:Kai...

by totally removing the core of it, and putting that new thing on top, instead of simply tearing it down, and build something really new from the bottom up.

I mean, if it had been this building

[2] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaispeicher_A#/media/Datei:Kai...

it would at least have had a history, including the timeball on top of it, which signalled the ships the exact time they could adjust their chronometers to at exact 12:00hrs.

But it wasn't. Just a functional building to store cocoa and coffee beans, built in 1963 over the ruin of the former building.

Was that worth to uphold the facade of? 798.000.000€ for the town, and about 100.000.000€ by some fanbois, and who knows who?

I don't get it.

"Das Wahrzeichen des Wahnsinns. Mors, Mors."

This on its own isn't enough to refute OP, since it could very well be that the equivalent cost of one of these other historic buildings is even higher. (e.g. cost of skilled slave labor vs equivalent labor in modern markets, cost of materials, etc)

EDIT: Hmm, even the payer's power could be factored in. A king may be willing to spend 1/10th of his empire's wealth on an extravagant palace, but the same would likely not be approved in a democracy.

I visited the elbharmonie and man that whole neighborhood is probably the most lifeless boring place in europe

Agreed. On the plus side, it has Miniatur Wunderland - arguably the best reason to visit Hamburg in the first place...