As a humble Aussie and loyal ally of the U.S. - may I make the following suggestion please?
Build the the two towers exactly the same as before except this time, don’t make them office towers which are open for business tenancy (who would want to work in them?) but rather, make them two giant atriums filled with magnificent hanging gardens and waterfalls filled with nesting spots for the worlds most beautiful birdlife. Indeed, build some lovely restuarants at various levels within the atriums giving diners an open sense of eating amongst the worlds largest greenhouses. A lovely and innocent reminder of what existed before…
This strikes me as being the most spiritually complete way of ‘bouncing back’ without putting further lives in a target zone as it were.
Oh, of course, on top of the buildings, put up the most powerful devastating array of anti-aircraft missiles in the world too.
You know what I find odd? There’s been meetings in NYC as to what to do with the site, and people have submitted plans/designs for the site, but a google search turns up nothing on them. One would think that there’d be something on the web showing the various proposals by now.
The thing is, it’s not ‘us’ who are going to rebuild the trade center. It’s not ‘our’ property and ‘we’re’ not paying the insurance premium. That is, unless you’re proposing it as a public works project.
Googling “rebuilding the world trade center” turned up this:
[hijack, sort of]
Remember in 1986 after the Challenger disaster there was a lot of people saying that it would kill the space program, that no one would want to risk another shuttle flight, etc. etc.?
Within a month there were people wearing t-shirts with a drawing of the shuttle and the words, I still want to go!
[/hijack]
“The thing is, it’s not ‘us’ who are going to rebuild the trade center. It’s not ‘our’ property and ‘we’re’ not paying the insurance premium. That is, unless you’re proposing it as a public works project.”
Odd that you would say this, listing your location as New York City. The World Trade Center was – and the site still is – owned by the Port Authority, which is a public corporation owned by the states of New York and New Jersey, which is to say ultimately the legal residents and taxpayers of New York and New Jersey.
Therefore, while it isn’t “my” property (being that I don’t live in New York or New Jersey), it IS “your” property and it IS a public works project!
The lease belongs to Silverstein Properties for the next 99 or so years as far as I know. The bank I work for brokered the deal. At the time of the sale of the lease I was in the real estate department. I hand delivered a bill for millions and millions of dollars (the bank’s fee) a couple weeks before they were destroyed. We (they) got paid a few days before the buildings went down.
I’ve often wondered how this will work out for that guy Silverstein. Imagine you successfully complete one of the biggest real estate deals ever, book the property for 99 years, pay everybody involved in the deal, and then boom - no more buildings. He still has the lease, but he is not the final word (by a long shot) concerning what will go up.
Either way, I think the PA controls the property, Silverstein has the lease, and it is ultimately owned by the nearby church whose name escapes me right now. So who’s property is it? In a sense it is everybody’s. In another sense it is the city’s (government’s), because they have to approve any plans. No one is asking me for my opinion, so as much as it is mine and yours in spirit, it is a privately leased, government controlled piece of property.
This reply is not meant to be smartassed. I’ve read here, and heard IRL, the “Make it Bigger” sentiment. Maybe so, but I just can’t see OBL sitting around with his buddies in 2008 saying “They rebuilt it, and made it even bigger. Now I’m really depressed”.
Peace,
mangeorge
“Having said that, I think that in this age of advanced telecommunications (Attrayant shines his own apple), companies don’t need to be geographically located in major metropolitain areas any more. I would bet that many companies are looking at cheap land in low-rent cities with the intention of rebuilding remotely and installing a T1 to set up a VPN so that all their locations, no matter where they are, will seem like they’re in the same building.”
People have been predicting this, or something like it, going back to the 1950s. During the dotcom boom, when everything “brick and mortar” was considered passe, gurus were predicting the death of offices (along with the death of stores, of course). Everyone will telecommute! Downtowns will be nothing but server farms! Didn’t happen. IMHO, won’t happen. I know I’ve gotten more done in some face-to-face meetings (yes, I know, ugh, meetings ) than in a month’s exchange of e-mails and telephone calls with the same parties on the same matter. IMHO, the face-to-face really does matter.
I’m a Chicagoan, born and bred. My entire adult working life has been spent in the area of the Loop, and I’ve had a Metra rail pass in my pocket nearly every month for a decade now. I can attest from personal experience that office builidngs are BEING built downtown and office buildings are PLANNED to be built downtown. My present office is in the growing area just west of the train stations, and a major bank is building an office tower for its back-office operations on the block between my office and one of the train stations. Not a front office downtown and a back office out in the 'burbs or some Sunbelt sprawlville, but the front office and back office both downtown.
Include residential and retail development in the mix, and a lot is going on in the heart of Chicago. Buildings going up all over the bloody place. It’s a cliched joke because it’s true: the Chicago city bird is the crane. The “man in the street” interviews a week or so after 9/11 showing (selected?) people proclaiming fear of living in or visiting the city have been disproven by the sheer number of people in the city on weekends, not only weekends with festivals but ordinary weekends as well.
As another poster pointed out for another city: “Manhattan real estate is scarce as it is - that is valuable property located in the heart of Manhattan’s financial district.”
If office parks and shopping malls and “billions for freeways but not one cent for transit” haven’t killed downtown, a bunch of yahoos hijacking planes isn’t going to either!
There were numerous proposals during the early days of the Cold War for de-centralization of US cities. They went nowhere. Super tall buildings may not be built for some years, but they will be built again. The demands of modern civilization require it.
I think the problem with renting vertical real estate space will be a real one, especially after most of the displaced companies have had to move somewhere else and set up shop. Jersey City is booming from what I hear
How about a ballpark? The Yankees wanted to move to Manhatten. Open land, excellent access.
As a native of NYC, I’ll add that I have no problem working in such places. I’m sure a lot of namby pamby shit-in-their-pants chicken littles will have such a problem for a while, but that will fade.
As to the enviro problems, that is being studied, and recent studies show no serious issues beyond the general ones for lower Manhattan.
As to the death of distance argument, crap I say. Lower Manhattan is about finance, and Finance is about relationships, and relationships are about personal connections. Anyone who makes these arguments has never had to do deals. You don’t do deals by email and video alone, you fucking press the flesh when it comes down to it.
) than in a month’s exchange of e-mails and telephone calls with the same parties on the same matter. IMHO, the face-to-face really does matter.