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| "The Real World Trade Center Memorial"
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"The Real World Trade Center Memorial"
(NEW YORK)(February 8, 2005) Since September 11, 2001 politicians have fallen over themselves to milk every ounce of personal profit from that horrible tragedy. One of the most obscene spectacles has been the continuing carnival over a suitable World Trade Center (WTC) “memorial.” Former Mayor Rudolph Giuliani and Governor George Pataki have drained the surviving families of any and every conceivable emotional energy by making extravagant promises that the World Trade Center is “hallowed ground” and must be preserved vacant for posterity. What nonsense.
Pataki and Giuliani have done everything to sabotage reconstruction of the original Twin Towers, or a reasonable commercial facsimile. Instead, they have--after much emotional hand wringing and propaganda--settled on a “Freedom Tower,” a vapid edifice that may never be built, and may collapse of its own inertia if it ever is built.
Adding to the tragicomedy is the flatulent self-promoting “architect” Daniel Liebeskind, brought in by Pataki to supervise the reconstruction, until the landlord’s architect, David Childs, dumped him. It has been a serial comedy with continuing installments.
I have a very special relationship to the WTC because thanks to the Port Authority of NY/NJ I was one of the earliest tenants in Two WTC, moving in January 1, 1974. I watched the attacks on 9/11 and spent time that evening near the cauldron. I have observed the Giuliani-Pataki political charade with disgust.
But, silently, almost stealthily, a real memorial to the World Trade Center tragedy and the people of New York has been under construction and is nearing completion: Seven World Trade Center (7WTC).
The original 7WTC was Mayor Giuliani’s emergency fuhrer-bunker and collapsed because of poor design.
Unlike a pending insurance dispute over the Twin Towers themselves, the insurance for Seven WTC was in order. Mr. Silverstein got his money promptly. After some negotiation with city officials, reconstruction began on a new and vastly improved 7WTC.
The building is taller than the original, leaner, and infinitely more elegant, almost sensuous. It “towers” over the empty Twin Towers site, looking down contemptuously at vacant land that has remained fallow because of craven political manipulation and incompetence. Seven WTC is a proud building, a striking building, and a real building.
7WTC is not some architecture-student’s class project, like the Liebeskind-Childs monstrosity “Freedom Tower.” The new 7WTC will be a silent but powerful testament to both the victims whose lives were extinguished, and to the ability of Americans to reconstruct in a reasonable commercial manner. The Giuliani-Pataki political grandstand operation has cheapened the sacrifice of the police and firefighters who died and the innocent people who perished on 9/11.
I looked at Seven WTC this evening and was stunned by its beauty. I like tall buildings, shining boldly in the dark. And it’s only half built. It won’t open to tenants until 2006. But the landlord, Larry Silverstein, has scored a knockout: he has built a better building, a commercially viable (i.e. profitable) structure, and he has created in his silent tower a memorial that speaks to the empty caverns below and solemnly reflects the cries of those whom eternity has called to be remembered for their sacrifice on 9/11.
Will people move in to 7WTC? Of course they will. All of the post 9/11 fears about high floors in tall buildings is so much rubbish. Donald Trump would die to market condos on the top 20 floors of a 120-story structure. People would line up to move in. It’s only human nature. We paper over the past and move on, and up.
I believe Seven WTC will be a successful building. It will make money and that, after all, is the reason for erecting an office building. Reconstruction was meant to reconstruct, not to provide a grandstand for Giuliani and Pataki to preen and flaunt their national political ambitions.
It is surprising that a landlord, Larry Silverstein, who never had any pretensions of building an eleemosynary mausoleum when he began the new Seven WTC, inadvertently created the ultimate memorial to the victims that New Yorkers will honor and prefer. People will ultimately reject the maudlin memorial planned for the vacant space that was once the vibrant commercial community of the WTC.
Am I against/have I ever been against a small, dignified memorial, tucked quietly in some corner of the site, reminding visitors of the great horror that took place? Not at all. But dedicating the entire WTC site to a perpetually vacant “memorial,” or making “memory” the centerpiece of the reconstructed WTC site, or chopping up the super-site to create “mini” cuts and jabs in the original layout, insult New York and insult the American people.
Americans are vibrant and, yes, powerful precisely because we pick ourselves up from tragedy and move along. Promptly. We do not mourn endlessly or excessively. Breast beaters and professional mourners do not enjoy acceptance in our great nation. We are alive, and we want to remain alive. We rebuild, bigger and better than before. We do not cower in the face of tyrants; never have, never will. That is why the ludicrous, ridiculous “memorials” skillfully orchestrated by craven politicians will never gain public acceptance at the World Trade Center.
Let’s rebuild office buildings and real commercial structures, with at least as much space as before, and even more if we can squeeze it in. That is in the spirit of New York, and it is the spirit of America.
Truly, the real memorial to the victims is rising. It is Seven WTC. Well done. |
Posted on Wednesday, May 31, 2006 (Archive on Wednesday, May 31, 2006)
Posted by admin Contributed by admin
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