World Trade Center site

The World Trade Center site, also known as Ground Zero is the 16-acre (6.47 hectare) plot of land on which the World Trade Center complex of New York City stood until the September 11, 2001 attacks. The lease for the site and control of its rebuilding is held by Silverstein Properties Inc. whose CEO is Larry Silverstein. Silverstein obtained the lease for the then-standing towers from the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey in July 2001 for $3.2 billion.

The Pile

The Pile was the term coined by the rescue workers to describe the tons of wreckage left from the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center. They avoided the use of "ground zero," which describes the epicenter of a bomb explosion.

The colossal pile of debris on the site smouldered for more than five months. It resisted attempts by the fire fighters to extinguish it until most of the rubble was removed. The effects of the combustion products on the health of the emergency workers were patent but the details are still a matter of debate.

Workers worked day and night to clear the wreckage and recover colleagues killed during the attacks. The site was officially cleared around Memorial Day (end of May), 2002, about 4 months earlier than expected.

The last standing piece of building steel, which was part of the South Tower, was draped with an American flag and carried out during a ceremony marking the last day of the recovery work. It was a symbol for all those lost whose bodies were never recovered or identified. It will be used to construct the bow of a new San Antonio-class amphibious assault ship, USS New York (which is specifically named for the state, not the city).

Since 2002, with the physical removal of the debris, the term pile is not used with respect to the World Trade Center site.

The debris itself was checked for human remains down to about the size of penny, however some families of the victims have asked for the debris which is located in a special area of the Fresh Kills Landfill on Staten Island (N.Y.) to be reburied at or near the site of the World Trade Center. Mayor Bloomberg has rejected this request on the grounds of cost and impracticality. A small memorial is planned at the landfill itself.

A few artifacts from the World Trade Center remain at the site, including the World Trade Center cross, and the "Survivors Staircase" which lead to Vesey Street. Also, a passageway leading to the Eighth Avenue subway platforms is preserved as part of the World Trade Center PATH station.

IAM International Agile Manufacturing LLC in Statesboro, Ga. bought a 50-ton piece of steel from the site and reforged it into one-pound "World Trade Center Commemorative Medallions (4.375-inches x 3.5-inches x 0.375-inches)." The foundry gave medallions to each victim's family and sold the remainder publicly without profit for $39.95 each. The medallions portrayed the former Manhattan skyline against the U.S. flag. After receiving complaints, the foundry stopped its reforging and the remaining steel was returned to the site where it was later sold for scrap recycling.

Steel and other items were recovered at the site and given or sold as the memorial buried relic at the U.S. embassy in Afghanistan, memorial crucifixes, the memorial flag, the memorial "last-piece" relic, memorial museum exhibits, memorial public art, and sold to foundries in China, India and South Korea and remanufactured as automobile parts, commemorative challenge coins, commemorative knives, a commemorative Star of David, food cans, household appliances, numismatic coins, paper clips, rebar and the USS New York amphibious transport dock bow. Despite this, only the production of reforged medallions was stopped; relatively few medallions are in private collection.

Reconstruction plans

2002

Six land-use plans, created under Port Authority guidelines, were released in July 2002 to great public scorn. The guidelines demanded that all commercial space destroyed had to be replaced even while streets were opened through the site, greatly limiting the possible designs. However one of the most popular options, rebuilding the Twin Towers, was ignored by authorities, partly at the insistence of WTC leaseholder Larry Silverstein. He is not comfortable with new office buildings taller than 70 floors and dreads the short-to-medium term vacancy risk of rebuilding the giant Twin Towers. His chief architect, David Childs of Skidmore, Owings, & Merrill, publicly denounced the original Twin Towers and the superblock as out of place and lacking in street activity or aesthetics. The July 2002 designs met with near-universal disapproval, forcing the government to restart the design process nearly from scratch but with the same guidelines. A popular element from the designs was an open parkway connecting the site to Battery Park, with line of sight to The Statue of Liberty.

Seven new designs were presented and winnowed to two candidates, one from Studio Daniel Libeskind, and one from the THINK architectural group, led by Rafael Viñoly, Shigeru Ban, Frederic Schwartz, and Ken Smith. While Libeskind's proposal (which largely repeated the July 2002 "Memorial Plaza" plan with more unusually-shaped buildings) was not accepted by the public, Michael Bloomberg and George Pataki preferred both the design and Libeskind's approach to dealing with the necessities of the project to the THINK group. The THINK proposal was championed by The New York Times architecture critic Herbert Muschamp. A public poll sponsored by the official planners saw the choice of "Neither" win comfortably over the THINK plan, with the Libeskind plan last.

2003

On February 26, 2003, Studio Daniel Libeskind's design was announced as the winning design. The design includes office buildings and a Wedge of Light which he claimed would honor the victims of the terrorist attacks by allowing sunlight into the footprint of the towers between 8:46AM and 10:28AM EST every September 11; shadow analysis has cast great doubt on this. Also the footprint of the towers will be largely preserved amid a huge sunken pit. Planning review continues, with many citizen groups of many angles strongly opposed to proceeding with this plan for various reasons.

Freedom Tower

The Libeskind proposal includes a 541 m - 1776-foot high tower. The chosen height in feet is a reference to 1776, the year that the United States Declaration of Independence was signed. Larry Silverstein, whose real estate company acquired the lease to the World Trade Center in July 2001, rejected the original design. In July 2003, he convinced Libeskind to hire David Childs of Skidmore Owings & Merrill as a co-architect of the proposed 1,776-foot tower, which Governor Pataki named the Freedom Tower. A draft design for the tower released December 19, 2003 was heavily criticized and as of January 2005 it was still unclear that building the spire according to the Libeskind design was even possible.Archinect: Discussion of Freedom Tower spire In May 2005 a thorough redesign of the tower was ordered after safety concerns raised by the police department.

On April 27,2006, a groundbreaking ceremony was held for the Freedom Tower.Construction Begins at Ground Zero (AP story)

Memorial

A permanent memorial called Reflecting Absence is being built on the site. Reflecting Absence, designed by Michael Arad, was the winning memorial of a design competition.

Memorial Museum

On October 12, 2004 the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation announced the selection of Gehry Partners LLP and Snøhetta as architects for the Performing Arts complex and the Museum complex.

The International Freedom Center and the Drawing Center were proposed for the World Trade Center site. On September 28, 2005, Governor Pataki withdrew support for them in response to criticism from victims' families and others.

In January 2006, Snøhetta redesigned the cultural center at Fulton and Greenwich Streets. The new plans remove the Drawing Center and International Freedom Center museum, reducing the size of the building.

The musuem associated with the memorial "will retell the events of the day, display powerful artifacts, and celebrate the lives of those who died." ^*

Transportation hub

A temporary PATH station reopened at the World Trade Center site on November 23, 2003, restoring service to New Jersey and providing connections to the New York City Subway. The temporary station will be replaced by a permanent transportation hub, designed by Santiago Calatrava, which will be connected to the Fulton Street Transit Center and have underground passageways to the World Financial Center, where there is a ferry access. Lower Manhattan Development Corporation - Transportation planning

Other buildings at the site

The site master plan as of September 2005 includes buildings designated as the Performing Arts Center and the Cultural Center in addition to the four office towers, memorial, PATH station and so-called 200 Greenwich Street. Detailed plans for them have not been made public. ^*

Legal disputes

Cost estimates for rebuilding the WTC site range from $10 to $12 billion. This was a major motivation behind Larry Silverstein's ongoing insurance trial. During the court proceedings, he insisted that the collapse of the Twin Towers were two separate attacks, thus entitling him to $6.8 billion, double the payment he made when he bought insurance for the complex in July 2001. His insurers disagreed, saying that the attacks were a single event, entitling Silverstein to half that amount. Silverstein was defeated in a court trial where the jury found most of the insurers limited to a single payout. With this verdict, which was read in May 2004, Silverstein lost $2.4 billion in insurance money. The dispute over $1.1 billion held by the remaining insurance companies was resolved by a jury in December 2004, when it was decided that the September 11, 2001 attacks constituted two separate attacks.

Currently, the World Trade Center site is accessible by subway and PATH trains at the new—and temporary—World Trade Center station. Much to some survivors' and victims' families' chagrin, the new PATH station uses the same track alignment as the old, meaning that the tracks pass through the south tower's footprint. ^* It is unlikely that this will change when the permanent PATH World Trade Center station is completed.

Other proposals

Donald Trump briefly raised eyebrows in May 2005 when he endorsed rebuilding the site with the Twin Towers 2 alternative rebuilding plan, and in June 2005 was one of the first to sign its petition to encourage Governor Pataki, Mayor Bloomberg, Larry Silverstein, and the Port Authority to re-think the Freedom Tower design and consider rebuilding the towers.

WTC 9/11 Memorials

World Trade Center Memorial under construction at the site
International Freedom Center adjacent to WTC site (proposed and rejected)
Tribute in Light WTC site (temporary performance)
World Trade Center cross Steel beams which form a cross and recovered from debris of the World Trade Center

References

Other

(on the terraserver image the towers are intact)

World Trade Center | September 11, 2001 attacks

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