The Battle For Ground Zero, Part XXV

Santiago Calatrava's PATH transit hub at Ground Zero has gotten the approval from the Port Authority after several modifications were made to the initial design to take into account security concerns.

Calatrava's plan will include a prominent display of one of the flags recovered from the site that is currently hanging in the Port Authority's headquarters.

Groundbreaking is set for September 6, five days before the fourth anniversary of the terrorist attacks that destroyed the WTC complex and murdered nearly 3,0000 people.

The terminal is scheduled to open in 2009.

As the New York Post notes, Calatrava's terminal is the first permanent structure to arise in the 16 acres of the WTC complex.

When complete, the transit hub will include a main hall as large as Grand Central Terminal and will serve as a transfer point for up to 250,000 commuters using its connections to subways and office towers, in addition to the PATH riders.

Calatrava unveiled his latest design after first drawing a picture of a woman looking upward at a bird in flight and describing his inspiration as "a kind of gift, a bird. Something very light, something very ethereal."

He said the terminal "represents the tremendous belief we all have in the future of the city."

The Post includes a drawing of the revised station.

Meanwhile, the New York Daily News relates the story of the Twin Towers II group unveiling their idea for a memorial over the footprints of the original towers. This group stands next to no chance of seeing their ideas come to fruition considering that the LMDC, Port Authority, and other agencies have signed off on the Freedom Tower concept. The approved memorial design that will be built is called Reflecting Absence, and was designed by Michael Arad and associates.

UPDATE:
What a way to bury the lede (my bad for not seeing this sooner):
The New York Times rears its ugly head once again in calling those who don't want to see the IFC and The Drawing Center involved in the memorial and rebuilding process - wait for it - unAmerican.

That's right, the paper assaults those that don't want the memories of those murdered by Islamic terrorists spoiled by anti-Americanism spewed by the IFC and The Drawing Center are unAmerican. Then the paper declares that the memorial space is large enough - that it exceeds the size of the Whitney Musuem. What does that comparison actually accomplish? I can make a logical and reasonable argument that the museum and memorial should take up all sixteen acres, be included as its own wing of a Smithsonian Museum building (about the size of the Air and Space Museum on The Mall should do), and have a travelling exhibit, complete with a multitude of 18-wheelers to show Americans all over the country what these Islamic countries did, and who they took from us. And, I wouldn't simply keep the museums focused on 9/11.

Nope.

I'd expand it to show all the other terrorist acts by Islamic terrorists, including the 1979 embassy takeover, the 1983 Marine barracks bombing, the murder of Leon Klinghoffer (and many other Americans murdered for simply being Americans), the USS Cole, Khobar Towers, US Embassies in Africa, the 1993 WTC bombing, the Millenium Bombing plot, the NYC subways plot in 1997, and countless other examples so that when someone says that this is somehow the fault of the current Administration, a learned retort would be - which Administration would that be? President Carter's? Reagan's? Bush Sr's? Clinton's?

Hat tip: Superhawk of Rightwingnuthouse.com (added post update).

UPDATE II:
Michelle Malkin and Knickerbockernews have more.