tower has a design lifetime of 80 years. History Portsmouth's Millennium Tower, as it was originally intended to be named, was a project conceived in 1995 to design a monument to commemorate the Millennium celebrations in the year 2000. It received UK National Lottery funding and was intended to open in late 1999. A choice of three different Millennium Tower designs were presented to the people of Portsmouth for a public poll in early 1998. Spinnaker, three observation decks incorporated within the top of a spinnaker sail-shaped truss structure, supported by conjoined twin towers that narrowed to a pinnacle at the top. Globe, a multi-floor transparent observation globe supported by twin support columns on opposing sides of the globe. Triple, three towers in a narrow triangular formation, the towers linked together by trusses. A tallest of the three towers (with a funnel-like top) giving access to offset observation decks supported by the two shorter towers. The poll was undertaken by Portsmouth City Council in conjunction with Portsmouth's local newspaper, The News between 11 February 1998 and 23 February 1998. The total number of votes received were 9,476, with 65% of the votes selecting Spinnaker, a design by local architects Hedley Greentree Associates Ltd. Due to political, financial, contractual and construction problems and extra funding requests by the builders Mowlem, construction did not begin until 2001 and was completed in mid-2005. Because of the six-year delay in opening and not having been ready for the Millennium as planned, the tower was renamed Spinnaker Tower instead, the design name it had been called in the 1998 public poll. A Portsmouth City Council official referring to the building delay said "It is personally very embarrassing as project manager and is very disappointing and upsetting". The overall development project was over budget, with the tower costing £35.6 million alone. Taxpayers were never intended to fund the tower, but Portsmouth City Council eventually contributed £11.1 million towards construction. In March 2004, Portsmouth Council's former leader Cllr Leo Madden resigned as leader of the Labour Group on the council after a highly critical report of the council's handling of the project and its failure to exploit revenue opportunities, such as the Millennium. Barry Smith, the project's legal advisor, also retired after being suspended on full pay, mostly because of controversy over the contract with the builders, which at one point would have cost the council more