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Six years after 9/11
11/09/2007 07:53 - (SA)
New York - Six years after the September 11 attacks reduced a swathe of downtown New York to rubble, work is now eventually under way to rebuild Manhattan's famously dramatic skyline.
Billionaire real estate developer Larry Silverstein, who took over the lease of the World Trade Centre just two months before the Twin Towers were destroyed in the 2001 attacks, is overseeing the multibillion-dollar reconstruction.
In a room littered with plans on the 10th floor of the only building to have been rebuilt so far at Ground Zero - the site of the destroyed World Trade Centre - he directs a small army of architects and engineers.
Their aim: to build a 21st century urban centre within six years to rise from the rubble where the Twin Towers once stood.
"Over the past 16 months, some 120 men and women - from different design and engineering firms but sharing a single set of offices - have put to work their unique expertise," Silverstein told reporters last week.
"Working together around the clock has fostered a creative energy and level of collaboration rarely achieved on this scale in the architectural world."
Silverstein reached a two-billion-dollar deal with a group of insurance companies in May to settle all outstanding disputes over the World Trade Centre site, ending years of wrangling, multimillion-dollar lawsuits and delays.
But his enthusiasm contrasts strongly with the state of progress at the site, which still largely resembles a building site, six years after hijacked jets reduced the Twin Towers to thousands of tons of dust and rubble.
The only building at the site so far to have been completed is 7 World Trade Centre, a 52-storey office tower.
The largest part of the reconstruction plan being overseen by architect Daniel Libeskind is the Freedom Tower, which is due to be completed in early 2011. Construction on the skyscraper began last year after a series of delays.
The enormous steel pillars that will support the edifice are already in the ground. The 541m tower, designed by David Childs, contains almost a quarter of a million square metres of floor space.
Most symbolically, it stands 1,776 feet tall - reflecting the year of the US declaration of independence.
Other parts of the reconstruction include Tower Three, a 71-storey steel and glass office block designed by Richard Rogers featuring diamond-shaped external struts, and Tower Four, a minimalist construction by Fumihiko Maki.
Both had been due to be completed in 2011, while Tower Two, a Norman Foster-designed 79-storey tower that will be New York's second tallest skyscraper was due to be up by 2012.
Silverstein now says construction on Tower Two, Three and Four should start in January next year and be finished by 2013.
"From a design perspective, each of the three towers is distinct, yet all three are architecturally compatible and work together seamlessly," he said.
The next major part of the multi-billion dollar reconstruction likely to be complete is a transit hub designed by Spanish Architect Santiago Calatrava.
Featuring what critics have labelled a stegosaurus-shaped station that allows light to filter down to the platforms below, it is due to open in 2009.
A memorial complex known as "Reflecting Absence" is also due to open that year featuring two square voids in the footprint of the original Twin Towers. Waterfalls on all four sides of the shafts feed into pools below.
Steel columns for the memorial are due to start going up later this year or early 2008, while a museum is also planned for the site.
"The National September 11 Memorial will be a symbol of our recovery from the attacks and will be at the heart of a rebuilt and revitalised Lower Manhattan," said the project's president, Joe Daniels.
- AFP
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