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Ground Zero, A National Disgrace
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| Zharen |
Link: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010...in6220282.shtml
| quote: | This was the year that Ground Zero was supposed to be transformed into a soaring statement of American spirit. The site of the 9/11 attack on New York was to be a world landmark, bigger than the World Trade Center before it.
Plans were announced for America's tallest tower, its most beautiful rail station and among its most solemn monuments.
So we wondered: why is Ground Zero still a hole in the ground? "60 Minutes" and correspondent Scott Pelley returned to lower Manhattan recently and found that, eight and a half years later, much of Ground Zero is still marking time.
Each year, on September 11, the emotions return. The sorrow, for the 2,752 people murdered there. The sense of 300 million Americans united in one place, and the desire to fight back by filling the void in the heart of New York.
But today, much of Ground Zero is still a pit where there are supposed to be five skyscrapers, a memorial, a museum, a theater and transit hub.
"So when you look out on where this project is after eight years, how would you describe this?" Pelley asked developer Larry Silverstein.
"I describe this as a national disgrace," Silverstein replied. "I am the most frustrated person in the world."
Silverstein is a New York real estate tycoon who believed that he would rebuild Ground Zero. "It's hard to contemplate the amount of time that's gone by here, the tragic waste of time and what could have been instead of what is today," he told Pelley.
Silverstein owns a 99-year lease on the property, which entitled him to rebuild the buildings there. But on the day "60 Minutes" visited with Silverstein, he even had a hard time even getting past the guard.
The holdup at the gate is a symptom of how much the relationship has soured between Silverstein and the government agency that is supposed to be his partner. Ground Zero is owned by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.
It's a behemoth of a bureaucracy that answers to the governors and legislatures of both states. The "Port," as it's called, runs bridges, tunnels and airports. The only skyscrapers it ever built were the Twin Towers, 40 years ago.
Today, the Port is responsible for making Ground Zero ready for construction, but it is years behind schedule, billions over budget, and there's no end in sight.
"If you continue going at the rate we're going, these buildings might not be finished until the Port's schedules, which is 2037. Now, I'm 78 years of age. I want to see this thing done in my lifetime," Silverstein said.
Seven years ago, architect Daniel Libeskind was named the winner of the competition to rebuild Ground Zero.
"Libeskind wanted to put a very large tower at the north end of the site," Paul Goldberger, who wrote a book on the project, told Pelley
Goldberger is also the architecture critic for the New Yorker magazine. "He had gardens at the top and this spire going all the way up to 1,776 feet," he explained, looking at a model based on Libeskind's architectural master plan.
"This is what Libeskind's plan looked like in early 2003 when it was chosen," Goldberger said.
"What people in this country thought was going to be built here," Pelley said,
"Yes, so did Libeskind, I think. But it wasn't," he replied.
The trouble started with the tallest tower. Silverstein didn't think the design was sensible as commercial real estate, so he insisted on bringing in a new architect. After a struggle of egos, the curtain was pulled to reveal a second tower design.
But this was the beginning of a pattern: lots of models, no buildings.
Instead of a construction site, Ground Zero became a stage for elaborate but meaningless ground breakings and ribbon cuttings.
One show was more than five years ago, when New York's then-Governor George Pataki laid the cornerstone for the second version of the tower.
"Today we take Adirondack granite, the bedrock of our state, and place it as the foundation, the bedrock, of this new symbol of American strength and confidence," the governor said.
The granite, with its inscription honoring the fallen and the "enduring spirit of freedom," was to be rock solid proof that the project was underway. "Today, we build the Freedom Tower," the governor said at the ceremony.
But the "Freedom Tower" wouldn't be built either. Instead it became a symbol of bureaucratic bungling. It turned out that communications had broken down with the police department. After construction had begun, the NYPD said the tower was vulnerable to truck bombs. Construction stopped for a year while a third version was designed and unveiled.
"It had become, sadly, much more ordinary. The NYPD required that it be elevated 200 feet above the street to protect it," Goldberger explained.
"So, it's standing on a pedestal?" Pelley asked,
"Standing, well, that's a nice way to put it, standing on a pedestal," Goldberger replied.
Asked how he would put it, Goldberger said, "I would put it, unfortunately, it's a building on top of concrete bunker. It was called by the governor the 'Freedom Tower.' But I said at one point around then, I wondered if it shouldn't be called the 'Fear Tower' instead."
Actually the Port Authority did change the name. "Freedom" was dropped in favor of "One World Trade Center."
Today, construction is underway on that 20 story blast proof pedestal. But most of the rest of the Ground Zero project is still a question mark, including the plans for a spectacular $2 billion train station.
It was back in 2005, in another one of those impressive ceremonies, when the Port Authority launched the station designed by star architect Santiago Calatrava. The station was due to be finished last year. But the cost has now doubled to $4 billion and not much is done.
"The Calatrava train station as originally announced is supposed to be standing here in front of us, then the Port Authority said 'Okay, 2011,'" Pelley remarked. "Is it gonna be there in 2011?"
"You judge for yourself. The excavation that was supposed to be done a long time ago is still going forward," Larry Silverstein replied,
What has gone wrong? Well failure has many architects.
A hard-nosed businessman like Silverstein resisted building landmarks that didn't make sense to him commercially. The Port Authority didn't have the staff or management to lead the development of the grand master plan. And because the Port is a state agency, the nation's most powerful mayor, Michael Bloomberg, became a by-stander.
Throw in egos, politics and incompetence and you have a project that's still in a ditch. Saving Ground Zero has now fallen to Chris Ward.
Ward is the latest executive director of the Port Authority. He was brought in a year and a half ago specifically to get Ground Zero off the ground.
"For me, this is a dream job. This was the job that I always wanted," Ward told Pelley.
"Come on. This ate up three executive directors before you. Now you're number four," Pelley replied.
"I'm number four," Ward acknowledged. "Well, you know, fortune favors the daring."
Ward has a background building big projects and a degree from the Harvard Divinity School, which can't hurt on something as bedeviling as this.
Ward set new deadlines and budgets and he's struggling to keep them. Most everyone agrees he's doing better than his predecessors.
Ward told us that one reason the work has slipped is the sheer complexity of coordinating so many projects on one site. The basement is 16 acres and seven stories deep. Everything is interconnected. A delay in one place can tie up the whole works.
"This is like a game of pick-up sticks down here. Every single part of this project touches another piece," Ward explained.
He sounds confident, but just try asking about the designs shown to the public.
"Are these things going to be built? Can you actually say that at this point?" Pelley asked.
"What I can tell you is that downtown will come back," Ward replied.
We asked for an update on all the major buildings.
According to Ward, One World Trade Center will be done at the end of 2013.
Asked about Two World Trade Center, Ward said, "Completion date uncertain at this time."
The same thing applied to Three World Trade Center, Five World Trade Center and the Performing Arts Center - completion dates uncertain.
Ward said Four World Trade Center would be completed in 2014.
Much of the uncertainty comes from the second disaster to hit Manhattan's financial district, the Great Recession. Financing and demand for office space have dried up.
Fair to say, the most sensitive piece of all is the memorial, envisioned to include two waterfalls in the footprints of the original towers. Demanded by the families, promised by politicians, the memorial is the Port's to build. Ward pledged to have it open by the tenth anniversary next year.
But we found his pledge depends on what the meaning of "open" is.
"Are you talking about being completed…it's going to open and stay open?" Pelley asked.
"That's what I want to be clear about. We will still be surrounded by building construction," Ward replied.
"So essentially, it's going to open on the tenth anniversary, and then it's going to close," Pelley remarked.
"I wouldn't want to say close, but we can't have a free-flowing open job site, when there's going to be heavy materials, cranes, tractor trailer trucks still feeding this as a construction site," he replied.
On the ten-year anniversary of September 11, $7 billion will have been spent, but not one project will be finished. Most of the buildings in the master plan are still in doubt and at best, a decade after the attack, Ground Zero will still look like a major construction site.
"When the master plan was announced, there was a dream and I wonder what killed the dream?" Pelley asked Paul Goldberger.
"What killed the dream was that it was nibbled away at gradually by politics, by money and the enormous complexity of bureaucracy. And by the lack of a leader with real vision," he replied.
New York has had leaders of vision in the past. Al Smith, the former governor, got the Empire State Building built in a year, during the Great Depression. But since 9/11 there have been three governors of New York, four executive directors of the Port Authority, and no one to see the project through.
The next chapter may be written by judges. In January, an arbitration court threatened to create its own construction deadlines if Silverstein and the Port Authority failed to come up with a new plan by March.
"You just want to work together to bring this together to bring this to fruition. To bring this to a successful conclusion," Silverstein said.
"But the fact of the matter is you and the Port aren't talking to each other anymore?" Pelly asked.
"Well, we're talking but not in the fashion that one would expect or hope for," he replied.
"Talking through your lawyers?" Pelley asked.
"Unfortunately," Silverstein replied.
Not even 20 tons of Adirondack granite survived this project.
The cornerstone laid with ceremony that Independence Day nearly six years ago was unceremoniously pulled from the site and sent back to the manufacturer. We found it where it rests now, 40 miles away along a highway on Long Island, a monument to the shifting plans and uncertain future of Ground Zero. |
Billions of dollars wasted, just to keep a hole in the ground...a hole in the ground. America, the land of Fools. |
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| saluyamo |
| quote: | | "I describe this as a national disgrace," Silverstein replied. "I am the most frustrated person in the world." |
Understandable
| quote: | | Silverstein is a New York real estate tycoon |
...Maybe he wants to lease some of the new offices?
| quote: | | Silverstein owns a 99-year lease on the property |
oooooh That is why it is a national disgrace... |
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| Max Thomson |
| larry silverstein is a snakey who profited heavily from an insurnace policy on the towers taken out mere months before 9/11. I wouldn't be at all surprised if this is just his way of funneling more money to him and his cronies. national disgrace is right. |
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| Zharen |
| quote: | Originally posted by Max Thomson
larry silverstein is a snakey who profited heavily from an insurnace policy on the towers taken out mere months before 9/11. I wouldn't be at all surprised if this is just his way of funneling more money to him and his cronies. national disgrace is right. |
I wasn't going to mention it for fear of being labeled a conspiracy theorist, but when I've read at least half a dozen different sites all saying the same thing, it's hard to deny it. |
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| jerZ07002 |
| quote: | Originally posted by Max Thomson
larry silverstein is a snakey who profited heavily from an insurnace policy on the towers taken out mere months before 9/11. I wouldn't be at all surprised if this is just his way of funneling more money to him and his cronies. national disgrace is right. |
why is he snaky for taking out an insurance policy on buildings which he was the pracitcal legal owner of? He just leased the buildings, that explains the timing. |
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| Moral Hazard |
| quote: | Originally posted by Max Thomson
larry silverstein is a snakey who profited heavily from an insurnace policy on the towers taken out mere months before 9/11. I wouldn't be at all surprised if this is just his way of funneling more money to him and his cronies. national disgrace is right. |
Putting my claims manager hat back on...
Silverstein and the Port Authority were paid a combined 4.57 billion for the total loss of the buildings. Silverstein had paid 3.5 billion for the lease. Silverstein continues to pay 120 million in lease payments to the Port Authority per year. Over 9 years he has paid 1.08 billion to lease a hole in the ground, which he receives no rental income from. Exactly where is his profit?
There is a stipulation in all insurance contracts that limits the maximum payout to any policy holder to their insurable interest... meaning the value they stand to lose by the loss or damage of the property. The courts found that the combined insurable interest of the Port Authority and Silverstein was 4.57 billion dollars; the losses for Silverstein are already in excess of that. I see no profit. |
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| Groundhog Boy |
| quote: | Originally posted by Moral Hazard
Putting my claims manager hat back on...
Silverstein and the Port Authority were paid a combined 4.57 billion for the total loss of the buildings. Silverstein had paid 3.5 billion for the lease. Silverstein continues to pay 120 million in lease payments to the Port Authority per year. Over 9 years he has paid 1.08 billion to lease a hole in the ground, which he receives no rental income from. Exactly where is his profit?
There is a stipulation in all insurance contracts that limits the maximum payout to any policy holder to their insurable interest... meaning the value they stand to lose by the loss or damage of the property. The courts found that the combined insurable interest of the Port Authority and Silverstein was 4.57 billion dollars; the losses for Silverstein are already in excess of that. I see no profit. |
Well, now you're talking sense...and we'll have none of that here. |
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