Friday, October 11
The Lower Manhattan Development Corporation agreed this week to adjust
the guidelines for the six teams that will be designing the World Trade
Center site to allow less office space at Ground Zero. In a deal reached
with the Port Authority and the city, the new regulations will require
the designers to include between 6.5 million and 10 million square feet
of office space on the site, which is less than the 11 million square
feet required in the original proposals released by the corporation in
July. While the reduction in office space opens the way for parks and
open space at Ground Zero, the architects and planners are being asked
not to include residential buildings on the site.
Under a federal program aimed at keeping residents in lower
Manhattan, 313 downtown tenants will receive checks this month for a
combined $625,000 over two years, according to officials in charge of
the program. More than 15,000 have applied for the grants, which pay for
30 percent of the tenants' monthly mortgage or rent payments over two
years up to a total of $12,000. The grants will also be tax-free,
according to Senator Charles Schumer's office. This week officials
representing Schumer said that the Internal Revenue Service is planning
on exempting lower Manhattan residents from paying most, if not all,
taxes on the federal grants they receive for staying in the area.
While an independent study issued in August suggested that the city's
emergency services require a unified command structure to oversee the
different departments, the city's fire and police commissioners said at
a City Council hearing this week that they did not feel such a structure
is necessary. The two commissioners agreed that the departments should
work more closely together during large-scale emergencies and come up
with a written protocol agreed on by both departments, but they argued
against the idea of a single authority, saying that such a system would
be impossible in situations requiring massive resources and where
conditions were changing rapidly. Others at the hearing disagreed, with
Peter L. Gorman, president of the Uniformed Fire Officers Association,
saying that if more steps weren't taken to coordinate the activities of
the emergency workers, "We are doomed to repeat our failures of 9/11."
Friday, October 4
Representatives of victims' families groups and the Lower Manhattan
Development Corporation began a six-day tour of memorial sites around
the United States this week. The trip is intended to help officials come
up with ideas for planning the World Trade Center memorial. Officials
dropped by Shanksville, Pennsylvania and the Pentagon with the intention
of discussing the coordination of memorial plans. However families'
groups were upset upon learning that the Pentagon's proposed memorial
will not list the World Trade Center victims alongside the names of the
184 victims who died at the Pentagon. Other sites to be visited include
the Vietnam Veterans' Memorial in Washington, D.C., the Oklahoma City
National Memorial, and the Civil Rights Memorial in Montgomery, Alabama.
Although 32 percent of those surveyed in a new poll by the New York
Times and CBS News think the new buildings at Ground Zero should be as
tall as the twin towers, 53 percent said they would not be willing to
work in buildings that tall. Just over half, also 53 percent, say they
would have no problem visiting an observation deck or a restaurant at
that height. 59 percent of those surveyed felt that the new buildings
should not be as tall as the World Trade Center towers.
Senator Charles Schumer drew criticism from public officials and
transportation advocates early this week after saying that federal funds
for rebuilding transportation should only be used for a new
transportation hub downtown, not for other transportation improvements.
Schumer argued that the money should not go towards projects that are
not directly related to the September 11 terrorist attacks. The
Metropolitan Transportation Authority and the Lower Manhattan
Development Corporation have been advocating for using some of the $4.6
billion from the federal government to renovate the South Ferry terminal
and the Rector Street subway station. The two state agencies say that
the renovation projects are important to the revitalization of lower
Manhattan. By the end of the week, Schumer met with rebuilding officials
and indicated that "there seems to be enough money for both."
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