The “Brand X” World Trade Center… A column in The New York Observer online reported on the possible Conde Nast move to One World Trade Center and how unhappy the Conde Nast employees are. So it seemed like a good opportunity to post a comment making the distinction between how people would respond to the real World Trade Center, as opposed to a “Brand X” knock-off:
“What is so surprising about finding out that people are resisting walking into the windowless lobby of a building, that happens to be shaped like a giant tombstone, that had to be clad in twenty stories of concrete because it was designed by an architect who had never designed a skyscraper before, let alone an entire complex – so it is positioned at the most vulnerable part of the site? Why is it a surprise that workers would say that the ‘place is a cemetery’ and say ‘it’s creepy’ when they will be working beside the most morbid memorial ever conceived, whose thundering waterfalls will mimic the roar of the crumbling towers and people will have to shout to be heard over the ‘white noise’?
“If they instead were being asked to move to 21st-century Twin Towers, that would be the most celebrated towers on the planet, and could start the day walking into sundrenched cathedral lobbies that would be alive with a sense of triumph and renewal, and could travel up instead of down at lunchtime to relax in the 40-story fresh-air atriums ringed with restaurants and shops – with ultra-prime residences above – they wouldn’t feel like it was ‘haunted.’ They would feel the excitement of being in the most fabulous buildings in the city, possibly the world, especially if the Twin Towers were built beside a tasteful rather than a garish memorial, with the sounds of orchestral bells chiming the hours instead of water rushing down giant drains.
“The Twin Towers Alliance is representing the position of most of the American people. If only the media had acted as watchdogs instead of propagandists we wouldn’t have to fight this bizarre battle. Where can anyone point to our position being aired and discredited? The Trade Center is being built on false assumptions and deception, instead of reason. Why is there a confusion of roles at the WTC site, which always has been and always will be public property? The Port Authority is our agent, Mr. Silverstein is our tenant, and the Mayor and Governors are our servants.
“It would be a mistake to think that the discontent in this country is limited to the Tea Party movement. There is an across-the-board disgust and alarm at government that doesn’t listen. Period. And nothing is more emblematic of the imperial arrogance of power than the strange WTC project. If our government has degenerated to the point where a handful of wealthy politicians and their tools in the media can shape America against the will of the American people, we’ve got problems that are far more lethal to our future than foreign enemies.”
http://www.twintowersalliance.com/petition/bulletins