World Trade Center

[WtcIndex?]

Anybody have some information about the World Trade Center buildings themselves?

They opened for business in December 1970, I think. They had 110 stories each. The only taller building in the United States is the Sears Tower in Chicago. [Unless you count various transmitter towers or the CN Tower in Canada.]

(Their construction took about eight years. How much did it cost? Who paid for their construction? Who owned them? Who was the architect? Anything special about the way it was designed and built?)

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey masterminded the construction, which required more than 10,000 workers. More than 60 workers died during the construction. The architect was Minoru Yamasaki (http://detnews.com/history/yamasaki/yamasaki.htm). Construction was completed in 1972/1973, with ribbon-cutting on April 4, 1973.

(Slashdot posted some info at http://cryptome.org/wtc-collapse.htm. Fox News (http://www.foxnews.com) had an article in "Views" (http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,34342,00.html) to the effect that asbestos was used only up to the 60th floor, had it been used higher it could have delayed the collapse by some hours, an asbestos-insulation inventor said that if a fire ever broke out above the 60th that the buildings would collapse.)

A quote from Minoru Yamasaki, the architect of the WorldTradeCenter (1912 - 1987): The World Trade Center should...because of its importance, become a living representation of man's belief in humanity, his need for individual dignity, his belief in the cooperation of men, and through this cooperation his ability to find greatness.

See http://www.reason.com/hod/ml091301b.html for an interview with Angus Kress Gillespie the author of Twin Towers: The Life of New York City's World Trade Center (ISBN 0813527422 ).

In the recent days, National Public Radio had an excellent short interview with the author of a book about the WTC - not sure if it was the same book listed above. Some highlights of the interview: Project was started because of Nelson Rockefeller's concern over business deserting Downtown for Midtown Manhattan. Moved to the west side when the Port Authority got involved, so New Jersey could be rewarded for its participation in the project by having commuter trains to the WTC from New Jersey. Architect was famous for plazas, put office space into big buildings to free up space for a plaza. A hundred different models were made of various combinations of towers, two towers considered much more impressive than one because NYC already had lots of big single towers, narrow windows used because of architect's fear of heights. Plaza never was liked much, with a lack of anything attractive in the way of design, landscaping or seating, and with enormous wind tunnel effects. Excavated material for foundations extended Manhattan island into the river, new land used for the Battery Park City complex including the World Financial Center.

DieHard4theMovie ("Die Hard with a Vengeance") showed a ruthless terrorist who set a bomb in the subway complex under the WTC, then rolled in with previously stolen dump trucks to tunnel to the nearby Federal Reserve and steal the gold.

News item on 9/15: Trade Center owner indicates desire to rebuild, probably not exactly duplicating the twin towers but something that would be as grand a landmark and as large a commercial complex.

--- It would be more useful to create a memorial site in its place.

I guess that depends on how you define "useful"... // to the benefit of the people

The towers held an enormous amount of office space, financial trading floors, and telecommunications equipment including phone switches in the basement and radio towers up top. The subway complex underneath is a major transit center for Lower Manhattan and a crucial connection across the bay to New Jersey. With the importance of those business functions, it wouldn't make sense to not rebuild. Perhaps the new design will include a memorial, but leaving the whole site bare of business functions for it to be a memorial would be an economic disaster, in my opinion. See the articles on cnn.,com today about 20% of NYC area office space being destroyed.

I don't think we need a memorial. Commemorating the acts of the terrorists gives them too much glory. Sometimes I think we should, as much as possible, simply erase the effects of what they've done. Not to mention erasing the terrorists themselves, and their threats. Leave it in the history books, of course, but nobody needs the heavy burden of remembering these attacks every day when they go to work. Why should they? Should people feel sad about this every day, forever? Should they feel guilty about it? No! I don't think we should let the terrorists undermine us in such a way. We need to reclaim our pride. Pride is the crown of the virtues!

: Here's an idea of what it should be like: http://www.makenynyagain.com/

Pride is the crown of virtues - now there's a dubious statement. America has memorials for soliders who died in its wars, it can have a memorial for the people who died here. Selective memory is not a good thing, especially not memory selected with the intent of boosting morale. Part of the problem with the whole situation is that almost nobody knows enough history to truly understand the causes or evaluate possible courses of action. I think forgetting the past is a big mistake. You can stop grieving and move on with your lives, but don't forget.