WTC Memorial - by Michael Arad (Architect) and Peter Walker (Landscape)

[americasroof]

I am willing to go out on a limb and say that it is likely that these people who will indefinitely stand around protesting have probably NEVER performed an act of charity or public service. If they had, they would know how totally self-centered and selfish they appear, when their time could be better spent helping someone in need.

This is what happens when you pay people ridiculous sums of money for enduring one of lifes many realities: death of a loved one. They have been subsidized to perpetuate a life of misery and empowered to infect us all with it.

In your spectulations, you don't have the facts one way or the other on the motives of the families and you make a considerable leap on your limb that these particular family members caused the bloat rot.

There's a lot of people out there (and on this forum) who think the billion dollar sink holes are foolish and wonder how the Port Authority manages to get away with not having to follow building codes.

It takes some courage to say the emperor has no clothes when the lemmings are running full gallop.

These families are just underscoring the point that not everybody thinks LMDC did the best job possible on handling matters.

Their protests will have no effect on the Monday's dog and pony show.

[ZippyTheChimp]

In your spectulations, you don't have the facts one way or the other on the motives of the families and you make a considerable leap on your limb that these particular family members caused the bloat rot.

You seem to be blaming the government for causing the bloat rot, while I think that most on the forum would agree that it was the families that initiated the problems, and we are blaming the government for enabling these families to continue this nonsense. If the families never initiated and continually revised their demands, none of this would have happened.

The PA proposed an above ground memorial with a bus garage underground. The families protested, stating that the "bathtub was sacred from bedrock to infinity" (or something like that). This immediately created conflicts with infrastructure that the PA knew would have to be returned to the bathtub area. The PA, LMDC, and governor should have rejected this concept outright as unreasonable.

Instead, every effort was made to relocate equipment elsewhere. The bus garage was relocated to the Deutsche Bank site. By the was, the additional expense of constructing another bathtub was never considered as part of the memorial cost, but you can add it to the $1 billion.

Then there were complaints that the bus ramp to the planned garage was too close to the memorial, so it was moved to the other side. The result is that the Liberty St park will be on a plateau. The new owners of 90 West St, who had just spent tens of millions renovating the landmark weren't permitted to complain about the hill that would be blocking the building.

The memorial that we have now was driven by family demands. I read over the past week that in 2004 the LMDC sent over 5000 copies of the memorial plans with drawings to family members.

"Approximately 400 forms were completed and returned by family members, with only one mention of a concern about the location below grade," [LMDC president]Pryor wrote.

An 8% response to the document. That coupled with a turnout of "several hundred" to a recent protest - nothing by NY standards - is clear evidence that these demands to stop construction are being driven by a handful of selfish people.

[lofter1]

9/11 Family Members Begin Round-The-Clock Vigil To Delay WTC Memorial Construction



“We expect nothing less to be on this site,” said the Reverend Bill Minson, a representative for the families. “And as it was said to the great pharaoh, ’Let my people go,’ I say to the all-powerful LMDC and the powers that be, ‘Let these families remember their loved ones in the light of day, not in the basement.’”

More on this individual ...

Reverend Bill Minson, Producer and Publicist



http://www.bizwiz.com/quickprofilepa...unications.htm

Producer, communication, urban and entertainment public relations specialist. Available for marketing consultation for stars, business and personalities. Providing 'quality' services for clients is a must!

http://www.tuday.org/billscv.html

Contact:
Reverend Bill Minson
Founder/Chairman TUDAY Communications
1205 Victoria Avenue, Ste 7
Venice, CA 90291

*********************************************

The following article is available only via Times Select, but tells the tale of Minson's very indirect link to Ground Zero ...

Life, Both Solemn and Loopy, Goes On at Ground Zero


ABOUT NEW YORK

By DAN BARRY
NY Times
March 8, 2006

One the fringes of ground zero, the pageant continued. People still pressed against the silvery fence. They posed for photographs ...

***

[americasroof]

You seem to be blaming the government for causing the bloat rot, while I think that most on the forum would agree that it was the families that initiated the problems, and we are blaming the government for enabling these families to continue this nonsense. If the families never initiated and continually revised their demands, none of this would have happened.

This forum might want to gang bang the families. But that's a misplaced bang. Horrible, weak, visionless decisions from the start bungled everything and set the stage. Families should never have been empowered the way they were. Families were not given veto power on the Arizona Memorial or the Alamo.

It's poor leadership that allowed this.

It's poor leadership that pushed a poorly thought out plan on GZ that enabled the uproar.

It's poor leadership that allowed the memorial selection process to run amuck (the guidelines allowed for massive changing of boundaries and throwing out the master plan as in fact happened).

It's poor leadership that called for the taxpayers to pick up the $10+ billion tab for cleaning up GZ without clearly defining the strings attached to this bailout.

Apparently none of the GZ leadership had children. You need to set boundaries and rules and show who's in charge. Otherwise the kids take over.

It was NYC's good fortune to have Rudy on 911. It's been NYC's misfortune to have George in charge of the aftermath.

You can't blame the families for this disaster. The parents left the kids in charge.

[lofter1]

You're right ... One is to blame: PATAKI

... Horrible, weak, visionless decisions from the start bungled everything and set the stage. Families should never have been empowered the way they were. Families were not given veto power on the Arizona Memorial or the Alamo.

It's poor leadership that allowed this. PATAKI

It's poor leadership that pushed a poorly thought out plan on GZ that enabled the uproar. PATAKI

It's poor leadership that allowed the memorial selection process to run amuck PATAKI

It was NYC's good fortune to have Rudy on 911. It's been NYC's misfortune to have George in charge of the aftermath.

[americasroof]

You're right ... One is to blame: PATAKI

Here's a flashback to Andrew Cuomo in April 2002 during the governor's race.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,51083,00.html

Pataki "stood behind the leader. He held the leader's coat. He was a great assistant to the leader. But he was not a leader," Cuomo had said.

The quote may have cost Andrew major political office (although he's running for attorney general now). But in 20/20 it is probably right on.

Who knows what would have happened at Ground Zero if we had voted for Cuomo and not the...

[ZippyTheChimp]

This forum might want to gang bang the families.

This is at least the second time in this thread you have used the same sophmoric response to anyone who has the temerity to criticize "the families."

Your own posts:

Giuliani wanted to the whole 16 acres with its secondary buildings preserved as a Normandy style park which presumably would have involved an open air park. At the very least the footprints of WTC1 and WTC2 should be preserved. The present plan comes about as close to that as is possible.

The bathtub is a side show. The images that were burned into everybody's minds were above ground level. And people need something above ground level to relate to.

Guiliani understood this. Pataki did not. The governor dba LMDC signed off on the Libeskind plan to hide the disaster 70 feet below ground so that it would in effect be a Rockefeller Center style piazza before the planned grand architecture zoo. Arad's design basically fulfills this mission although the top of it is at street level, the memorial itself is still sunk.

Most people looking at a map of the plans would think that given the significance of 911, it deserves its own block (bordered by Fulton, Greenwich, Liberty and West). The core square footprints of 1WTC and 2WTC are there. That area is in effect a battlefield and thus building on it should be at a minimum. Life around it should it should be allowed to continue. Arad's design takes a good chunk of this space off the table by turning it into a pit.

So what exactly do you want?

A six acre at-grade memorial park including the underground stuff? That is not a popular choice among Downtown residents. But "the families" would love it, because it would allow them to exert more influence on the surrounding area. Giuliani's last pronouncement before he left office was that the entire site should be a park, and "the families" embraced it.

A six acre at-grade memorial park excluding the underground stuff? We tried that. "The families" didn't like it.

A smaller at-grade memorial minus the underground stuff? "The families" would scream.

A smaller at-grade memorial including the underground stuff? That's more bloated than we have now.

Preservation of the tower footprints and an open-air memorial? Well, now we're back to the Libeskind pit.

[americasroof]

So what exactly do you want?

What I think they should do is pretty much moot now with the big show scheduled for Monday.

Given NY politics, Rudy's vision of a big park probably would have been whittled down to what we have now -- a 6 acre at grade core block surrounded by the new buildings. Throw in a couple ruins and the sphere and you would have a memorial that everybody would have been happy with or at least could live with. If plans for that were announced tomorrow I bet the whole family drama would disappear or at least would become manageable.

The placement of the museum underground would work in that scenario as that would be consistent with architecture of buildings at the time (e.g., the WTC itself, museum at the Gateway Arch, and stores at Citigroup Center). Undeground features should be kept underground. Underground features of the original Penn Station (e.g., the platforms) are still in tact and in use. Do you see the glory of the original by looking at them?

The families have gone nuts because of attempts to totally obliterate the site and have nothing above ground as a symbol.

Anyway, this is all moot. Our "leaders" think that spending billions on a high tech uninspired memorial is better than following the traditional simple low tech memorial process that has worked for centuries. Is it the families or our "leaders" who are driving this? Which will better stand the test of time -- the high tech pit waterfall that will require huge outlays for maintenance? Or a simple ruin?

[Cityslob]

The Mayor was quoted again today as saying "you can't please everybody."

When the real question is who has been pleased?

I believe that list is smaller than you think.

[JMGarcia]

It seems to me that no one is particularly happy with the memorial so there's no sense in continuing to argue about that. What you guys are argueing here is how best to fix that. There is a sharp deliniation of ideas on that and it centers around either giving the vocal minority of the families more or less say in the matter.

I vote less, way, way, way less.

[Cityslob]

I wonder what your views might have been if you had been affected by the events of September Eleventh?

The vocal minority of family members you speak of, are only the representatives of many.
And while the family members have been a severely fractured group of different ideas, the lies they have been told, the deception they have witnessed, and the failures of the final design have brought them closer together, then ever before.

[BPC]

I wonder what your views might have been if you had been affected by the events of September Eleventh?

Um, I would say that most New Yorkers would claim, legitimately, to be "affected by the events of 9/11." As for me personally, I was evicted from my home for a couple of months, lost at least one business colleague, saw my neighborhood destroyed, and witnessed other awful things which I need not detail. Now am I entitled to an opinion on this issue? What about someone who moved into the 'hood on 2002? Do they get a say about the fate of the place where they are raising their family? What about someone who works in the 'hood to put food on the table. Does he/she get a vote? Can you explain the hierarchy here?

[ZippyTheChimp]

There's that word hierarchy again.

[JMGarcia]

I wonder what your views might have been if you had been affected by the events of September Eleventh?

The vocal minority of family members you speak of, are only the representatives of many.
And while the family members have been a severely fractured group of different ideas, the lies they have been told, the deception they have witnessed, and the failures of the final design have brought them closer together, then ever before.

I worked in the WTC up until 9/11. I'll leave it at that as to how I might have been affected.

I do not believe the vocal minority represents the majority of family members. The vocal minority might have deluded themselves into believing that but it is simply not the case.

I also question whether what they consider "lies they have been told" are, in actuality, simply decisions that have not gone their way. They do seem to believe that they must be obeyed and they consider those who do not follow their dictates to be traitors, immoral, corrupt, and incompetent for their disobedience.

[davestanke]

Family members, as typically used, means those who have chosen to become WTC site plan lobbyists after 9/11. They are professional (or they have hired professionals). They are free from ongoing responsibility. They create needs that have to be satisfied and then sell other family members on those needs. They create feelings of self-righteous victimization to increase their own power.

Many family members have chosen other ways to go forward and are completely unaffected by the activists. Others, who are simply lost, latch on to their causes for hope of some sort of satisfaction.

It is impossible to please all family members. Those who think less is appropriate just walk away from the whole thing and move on with life. Those who want more stay and keep pushing. It's simple rules of human behavior.

If there were some way to poll family members and 20% said they wanted something on the scale of a Vietnam memorial ($200 Million memorial built into the plaza) and 20% said they wanted current plans or more, how would you settle it? The answer has been that you answer it by accomodating all but the most extreme demands: meet the needs of 95% and only 5% are left to complain.

While I blame Pataki, given the 9/11 sympathy and the refined expertise of a few people on playing to it, I also understand why he made some of the decisions he made. Understand but don't agree.