11/16/10 — “The Best-Laid Schemes…” The image below appeared on Curbed NY with commentary on the latest WTC stumbling-block, revealed in a Steve Cuozzo column in today’s New York Post. Cuozzo, who is the chief cheerleader for the current, irrational, plan, is shocked to learn that driving streets through a site that had a moat of protection around it will result in “over-restrictive security plans” that may “damage prospects for the site just as redevelopment is finally taking off.”
At a 9/11 symposium at Pace University in September 2006, Tal Barzilai, a young man who is devoted to seeing the Twin Towers rise again and faithfully attends every public hearing, asked the panel why the Twin Towers had not been included when the rebuilding plans were being considered. Stefan Pryor, then head of the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation (LMDC) gave only one preposterous reply. He said it was an imperative to restore the street grid! So now the chickens have come home to roost.
Another fawning “reporter” on the WTC, Julie Shapiro of DNAInfo.com, wrote “One World Trade Center’s Shining Facade Begins to Rise.” The piece begged for a response, so we left two comments, which are posted in reverse order, with no paragraphs to help break up the material. Since those comments sum up the current state of affairs, we have developed the information into “The Best-Laid Schemes” and posted it on the Home page.
At what point will they admit that they have brought the unending problems on themselves? Whether they admit it or not, the fact is that we are all paying an incredibly high, incredibly wasteful, incredibly unnecessary price.
11/11/10 —“For the Record”… According to a November 10th New York Post article, “The rebirth of the World Trade Center took a spectacular turn yesterday when one of the memorial’s two massive fountains roared to life for the first time. ‘It was absolutely stunning,’ said Joseph Daniels, president of the 9/11 Memorial. ‘The way the sunlight played on the water, and the sound. It was perfect.’”
The piece went on to explain that the fountain, where the North Tower of the World Trade Center once stood, was undergoing tests of the massive pumping systems that will blast 26,000 gallons a minute over the 30-foot deep black granite walls. It noted that during the design phase of the memorial, there were concerns that the fountains might be too loud. But Daniels said the sound created “a nice, peaceful background, like the sound of the ocean. It’s perfect. It’s not overwhelming at all.”
Nevertheless, it remains to be seen what it will sound like when 26,000 gallons per minute become 52,000 gallons per minute. Prominent builder Frank Sciame once described the waterfalls at LMDC hearings as “so loud as to be headache producing” and “impossible to stand near for any length of time.” And the same piece that referred to the “peaceful” sound also noted that the fountain “roared” to life.
The Twin Towers Alliance has made it clear that we think the current memorial was not a good choice for reasons that have little to do with personal opinion. But we have resisted the temptation to get embroiled in controversy over the Memorial because we believe – along with most Americans – that restoring the skyline would be the truest memorial of all. That is where our focus is. Meanwhile, we hope as much as anyone that the National 9/11 Memorial and Museum will succeed in its mission and be a fitting memorial of all that we lost that day.
10/31/10 — “The Element of Surprise”… One of the latest comments on the petition suggested that we should be open to the Twin Towers rising in other cities. We are. “Twin Towers II” is a fully designed, re-engineered plan to restore what is quite possibly the most celebrated skyline in the world, but, as it happens, there is already interest in building the plan in another city. The idea of generating images with the Twin Towers rising in other skylines is a good one that we will pass along to Ken Gardner, the man who conceived of and designed the plan, mentored by the late Herbert Belton, AIA — an architect on the original WTC.
As for the Twin Towers Alliance, we read the same media reports as everyone else, so we appreciate why people would think it is too late, but it is not. Our new posting on the home page — The Bellwether at Ground Zero — explains one reason why. The New York Times article in September made it impossible for officials to keep pretending they are doing the right thing at the World Trade Center. But even more importantly, it made it impossible for responsible journalists to keep their blinders on.
We realize that faithful supporters come to the site and to this page looking for news and when they don’t find it they think that we’re losing the fight and nothing is going on. Nothing could be further from the truth. There is SO MUCH going on that it is hard to keep up with all of it. But instead of broadcasting what is ahead, we are going to let it unfold.
