The Rebuilding of Ground Zero, Part 64

You've got to be kidding me that the LMDC and other relevant entities are unable to get the former Deutsche Bank building demolished. Another fire at the site, which pretty much went unreported by the media, stopped work for most of April.

The Lower Manhattan Development Corp. says the small fire in a power distribution box stopped work for most of April at the former Deutsche Bank tower. Contractors now say it will be January 2010 when the tower is completely dismantled, about three months behind its latest schedule.

The building demolition deadline has once again been pushed back to January 2010.

It was supposed to be demolished by mid 2008, but the discovery of additional remains from the 9/11 attacks, a deadly fire that killed two firefighters and other assorted accidents, has repeatedly delayed the project.

Those delays compound construction delays at the rest of Ground Zero, particularly the construction of the underground transit security facility, the entrance to which is located where the former Deutsche Bank building stands.

Now, deconstruction isn't expected to restart until July. Decontamination work must proceed and be completed before deconstruction can proceed. It's expected that once decontamination work is completed, it should take six months to deconstruct the building. We'll see about that, because everything about this part of the project has been plagued with delays.

Lest we forget, the situation at Fiterman Hall isn't much better. While there haven't been any fatalities or accidents, it still remains a hulking ruin on the North side of Ground Zero, flanked by the gleaming new 7WTC and a stark reminder that the City and State, LMDC, CUNY, Port Authority, and the Dormitory Authority have failed miserably to move these projects along.

UPDATE:
Now Mayor Bloomberg calls for a summit to deal with the Ground Zero mess? We're nearly eight years into the rebuilding efforts, and Bloomberg finally pitches this idea? Where was he three years ago? Five years ago?

The fact is that Bloomberg actually has little sway over rebuilding efforts at Ground Zero since it's between the Port Authority and Silverstein Properties to get a deal done. They've been bickering since day one, and the Port Authority remains behind schedule on getting the site prepared for Silverstein to build.

Meanwhile, Bloomberg's prior ideas for the site included dropping the office space and pushing residential real estate instead (let's ignore that any new office space at Ground Zero would compete with his company's Midtown office space for tenants and which would have favorable leasing rates).