The Battle For Ground Zero, Part 77

Silverstein is being pressured to cede control over the entire WTC site.

State, city and Port Authority officials are increasing pressure on Larry A. Silverstein, the developer who controls the World Trade Center site, to relinquish at least a portion of the 16-acre property so that the rebuilding effort can proceed more quickly.

In recent weeks, Anthony R. Coscia, the chairman of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, has proposed to Mr. Silverstein that he proceed with the Freedom Tower - by far the most visible symbol of the redevelopment - and a second building, while ceding much of the site back to the authority, which owns the 16-acre property. The Port Authority, in turn, would reduce Mr. Silverstein's rent, which rises to almost $12 million a month in January.

State officials also broached the idea with Mr. Silverstein.

Mr. Coscia confirmed that he had spoken to Mr. Silverstein on the matter, but declined to discuss it. John N. Lieber, senior vice president at Silverstein Properties, declined to comment on talks with Mr. Coscia.

The proposal comes as Mr. Silverstein is in heated negotiations with the city over his request for the remaining $3.35 billion in tax-exempt Liberty Bonds, which he needs to finance the office towers, and the conditions the city wants to impose on their use. A public hearing on the matter is set for tomorrow, and the city's Industrial Development Agency is scheduled to vote Dec. 13, if the two sides reach an agreement.

This move would essentially hem in the areas that Silverstein could build upon, and open up the possibility that the Port Authority gets back in the building business. And that's an interesting move since the Port Authority was supposed to be getting out of the building/building management business to focus on its core mission - to improve the Ports of New York and New Jersey and operate the various transportation links.

Meanwhile, the LMDC is looking for a Senior Planner for Lower Manhattan will oversee the Department’s role in the planning and revitalization of Lower Manhattan including the redevelopment of the WTC site. On Craigslist. Curious. I guess it's cheaper than running it in the New York Times or Monster.com. HT: Gothamist

On the lighter side, with the new King Kong movie coming out, the NYT has a discussion of the WTC, Twin Towers, and how the Empire State Building remains the preeminent skyscraper in NYC, despite having being overshadowed by the Twin Towers:

Ric Burns, the filmmaker who directed the trade center documentary "The Center of the World," said that the center "was taller, but it never had the same metaphoric power." He added, "Other tall buildings may have superseded it, but in a funny way the Empire State Building never lost its stature."

And while the Empire State Building has replaced the World Trade Center in contemporary depictions of New York, "it is not yet clear whether it will do so in the city's collective imagination, where the twin towers linger on, like phantom limbs," Dr. Wallace said.

The widespread desire to build something as tall as the vanished buildings - one of the forces propelling construction of the Freedom Tower - "suggests a yearning to fill that hole in the sky," he said.

And the new "King Kong" has come to New York "in an incredible moment," Mr. Burns said. "It is a time of two powerful absences - the building that is not there, and the building that is going to be there."

But Kong may have lost much of his power to menace. "The threats to our architecture have surpassed the giant ape," said Debra Burlingame, a member of the World Trade Center Memorial Foundation board whose brother, Charles F. Burlingame III, was a pilot of the plane that hit the Pentagon. "Airplanes with jet fuel were far more dangerous than any primate, however big."

In the future, then, will some filmmaker perpetrate another remake depicting a noble, misunderstood ape battling airborne weaponry atop the Freedom Tower, or other skyscrapers as yet unborn?

"Even if they build big ugly new towers," Ms. Ruth, the Empire State's special-events coordinator, said, "nothing will be as beautiful as our Art Deco landmark."

UPDATE 12/8/2005:
Payback's a coming. Larry lashes back at critics.

Technorati: World Trade Center, WTC, Pataki, LMDC, urban policy, Freedom Tower, IFC, International Freedom Center.