- Title: USA: Vision for rebuilding New York's World Trade Center site is unveiled
- Date: 8th September 2006
- Summary: (BN17) NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK, UNITED STATES (SEPTEMBER 07, 2006) (REUTERS) LAUNCH STAGE WITH LARRY SILVERSTEIN, GOVERNOR GEORGE PATAKI, DANIEL LIEBESKIND, LORD NORMAN FOSTER, LORD RICHARD ROGERS, FUMIHIKO MAKI AND OTHERS ARCHITECT FUMIHIKO MAKI LORD RICHARD ROGERS LORD NORMAN FOSTER NEW YORK GOVERNOR GEORGE PATAKI SPEAKING AND OTHER PARTICIPANTS ON STAGE; JOURNALISTS AND PHOTOGRAPHERS (SOUNDBITE) (English) GEORGE PATAKI, NEW YORK GOVERNOR, SAYING: "I want to congratulate you, Lord Norman Foster, Lord Richard Rogers, Fumihiko Maki, you are three brilliant architects you have done a brilliant job. It d s pay tribute to the her s of September 11th, it d s respect the sanctity of this entire site and it d s move lower Manhattan forward as a 24-hour community that will be the financial capital of the world as well one of the most exciting places to live or to work." APPLAUSE AS PATAKI SITS DOWN
- Embargoed: 23rd September 2006 13:00
- Keywords:
- Location: Usa
- Country: USA
- Topics: General
- Reuters ID: LVA22A5Z0LKWB855736Q0FT3PUZI
- Story Text: Three celebrity architects on Thursday (September 7, 2006) unveiled designs for three new skyscrapers at the site destroyed by the Sept. 11 attacks, giving the world its first comprehensive look at how the rebuilt World Trade Centre will look.
Britain's Norman Foster and Richard Rogers and Japan's Fumihiko Maki each designed one of buildings that will swirl around a memorial where the Twin Towers once stood. Construction is due for completion in 2012.
At heights of 1,350 feet (411 metres), 1,255 feet (382 metres) and 946 feet (288 metres), they will be among the tallest buildings in New York. But they will be eclipsed by the neighbouring 1,776-foot (541-metre) Freedom Tower, whose final design by American David Childs was revealed earlier this year.
Foster's building may be the most eye-catching, appearing to be a cluster of four slender towers, each with diamond-shaped tops tilted at an angle.
Rogers's tower is distinguished by diagonal exterior supports and topped by four functional antennae, one at each corner of the roof. Maki's building, though the shortest, most evokes the old Twin Towers through its look and feel in a nod to their architect, Minoru Yamasaki. Their architectural teams collaborated so that the designs, while distinct, would be harmonious.
Said Lord Richard Rogers of the collaborative experience, "I always say that buildings are about making art out of compromises. The very fact that buildings have to have structures, the very fact that they have to have doors and so on, it's all, if you like, a compromise. The client was very good. He had very clear briefs. The strategic planning was very clear. Those are constraints rather than compromises, I prefer the word constraints." All three will have several levels of retail space just above and below ground level in bid to revitalize lower Manhattan. The Foster and Rogers buildings also feature massive trading floors to lure large financial tenants. "The process is very, very intense so you're, and everybody has their own agenda, you know. Larry has to lease this on a market. There are certain market needs. Somebody else will see shopping needs, somebody else will quite rightly, see security, somebody will be looking at it in terms of transit and its access. The community will have their agenda and we all have the memory of the event that has triggered this," Lord Norman Foster told Reuters. The buildings conform to a general master plan by Daniel Libeskind, who envisioned four skyscrapers of descending heights swirling around the memorial, which will be marked by a pair of waterfalls dropping into below-ground reflecting pools on the footprints of the original Twin Towers.
A total of 2,759 people died in the hijacked plane attacks on the World Trade Centre.
Fumihiko Maki, whose team designed tower 4, said that his intention with the design was to show respect to the Memorial Park which will be across the street from tower 4. "We wanted to have a building with a certain quietness, with dignity, particularly in the front or behind of Memorial Park. And we have chosen the strategy to make the building fairly abstract," he said.
All of the new skyscrapers will have floor-to-ceiling glass walls offering spectacular vistas. In a selling point to corporate executives seeking status-building corner offices, all of the towers have columns that are recessed from the corners, providing unimpeded views.
That feature came on the orders of Larry Silverstein, the developer who signed a 99-year lease on the World Trade Centre site six weeks before it was destroyed on Sept. 11, 2001. A Silverstein spokesman said there is not yet a cost estimate for the rebuilding project.
After protracted disputes over insurance, design, security, financing and control over the site, construction on the Freedom Tower finally began in April.
Libeskind provided an ambitious design for the Freedom Tower that police and security experts later determined was too risky for a building that is presumed to be a desirable target for a future attack.
Silverstein then chose Childs to redraw the Freedom Tower, whose main structure will have a similar height and profile that each of the Twin Towers had, but with a taller and more pronounced antenna.
The developer also asked Childs to design the three other skyscrapers, but Childs said he believed those jobs should be offered to others, leading to the selection of Foster, Rogers and Maki. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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