by Lionel Bascom — July 12th, 2008 — 1 comment
It will be at least another two months before the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey releases new timelines and budgets for projects at the World Trade Center site. Still, the new PA chief is still hoping the planned 9/11 memorial park will be completed on time.
During a special meeting of CB1’s World Trade Center Reconstruction Committee, Port Authority executive director Christopher Ward, who faced the committee along with six other key players in the redevelopment of the trade center, said he wants to see construction of the memorial park completed and open to the public on or before Sept. 11, 2011, the 10th anniversary of the terrorist attacks.
“The delivery of the memorial is the driving force, and the date of the ten-year anniversary is the date that we’re working towards,” Ward said. “We believe that there can be an appropriate location…that would allow somber recollection and a healing process on that date.”
Citing the memorial’s planned plaza with its grove of trees, along with the hollowed outlines of the twin towers and their reflecting pools, Ward said it is the Port Authority’s hope that “in large measure,” those parts of the memorial, though not the museum, will be completed.
The eight-acre Memorial Park will occupy the southwest corner of the World Trade Center site, just to the south of where the Port Authority is currently building the Freedom Tower. Ward said the park, which includes two reflecting pools in the shape of the original Twin Towers, is the only element of the Authority’s many reconstruction projects on the site that stands a chance of being completed on time. Late last month, he delivered a sobering assessment of the Port Authority’s progress on the site, saying that most, if not all of the projects – including the planned 9/11 museum that will abut the park, the Freedom Tower, the Santiago Calatrava-designed transit hub and a vehicle security station—are millions of dollars over budget and years behind schedule. Ward said the Port Authority has since scrapped most of its original deadlines for the project’s completion.
7:46 AM in Uncategorized, World Trade Center, Ground Zero, Related Stories, Freedom Tower News
As long as a memorial is present on the 10th anniversary of the attack on America, those who have lost loved ones and those who mourn the death of pre-9/11 America will have the opportunity to illustrate to the world America’s strength in perseverance. This should provide a clear message to others out there that “God does help those who help themselves.”
Jeanne · July 12th, 2008 at 11:13 pm