WTC, different perspective

[LoudMusic]

During my parusing of the Terra Server images of Seattle I spotted a huge building (didn't even fit in the frame on the two closest zooms!). So I looked it up. I found the site that lists the tallest buildings in the world and spent about an hour looking over lots of fun info. Then I wanted to see the plans for the WTC replacement and cruised around.

I found this quote on CNN.

NEW YORK (CNN) -- Larry Silverstein, the developer who leased the World Trade Center six weeks before it was destroyed September 11, 2001, plans to replace all 10 million square feet of commercial space with five buildings over the next decade.

Talk about a ****ter of an investment ... But what pisses me off is that he has the ability to make one hell of a statement to the entire world, and he's going to build five buildings each shorter than the current tallest building in NYC. LAME! Might as well not do anything. Which led me to this thought ...

Perhaps the destruction of the WTC Towers isn't all bad. The 10M sq feet of office space was consumed by older buildings in NYC, bringing them back to life and stimulating construction and renovation business all over the city. Maybe the best thing to do with the site is to convert it into one giant memorial. But that will never happen because the buildings were commercial and the business that owned them still exists (think about the insurance payoff on that one!) and needs to use the space to pay off debts. The quickest way to do that, in my opinion, is to knock the socks off of everyone.

I go back to ... build a huge damn building! The biggest thing the world has ever seen! Twice as big as the current largest! Big enough to swallow the largest airplane and belch it back out!

What would be really cool, to me anyway, is to build something so large that generations of families could live inside the building and never leave. An entire city contained in one building. Self sustaining to a point, even. The research that could be acquired from such an adventure could help us colonize the ocean floor, antarctica, the Moon ... and even Mars.

Wow ...

 

[emad]

I remember waay back, the discovery channel was talking about some plans to build something like a mile high in hong kong and in Tokyo. The problem is that it would take a damn ****ing long time to build plus it would require a large percentage of the world's steel supply.
http://dsc.discovery.com/convergence/eti/projects/towermain.html
http://www.emporis.com/en/wm/bu/?id=101805
http://www.geocities.com/PicketFence/5192/tokyo2.html

 

[87chevy]

I think it's a cool idea LoudMusic! But redsources for something like that would be a problem. And it would take years and years and years to build. I think, personally they should have rebuilt them almost EXACTLY THE SAME. I think that would just be another SLAP in the face of the terrorists. I do think they should build something just as or taller than the original though. But until we start mining the Moon,the amount of steel for a building like you are talking about is probably unatainable.

 

[emad]

I remember it was something like an entire year's steel production for a medium sized country

 

[87chevy]

Well that's definately a lot, but doesn't sound unatainable so much now. If everybody chipped in, then it wouldn't be so bad. Ok, i should say, if we just bought it from a whole bunch of different nations, it wouldn't be so bad. But still sounds like a lot. I'm sure there was a lot of re-usable steel from the WTC. But some might be too superstitious to reuse that.

 

[DQuaN]

Originally posted by LoudMusic

Perhaps the destruction of the WTC Towers isn't all bad. The 10M sq feet of office space was consumed by older buildings in NYC, bringing them back to life and stimulating construction and renovation business all over the city.

WTF

So 6,000 people die, but its not so bad because the real estate can be made better.

Who ever wrote that can go **** themselves.

 

[Solid Lifters]

Originally posted by DQuaN
WTF

So 6,000 people die, but its not so bad because the real estate can be made better.

Who ever wrote that can go **** themselves.

Loud didn't say it was not bad, or 'not so bad' as you have put it. He just said not all bad, which might sound insensitive, but really isn't. He knows how horrible the event was. He was only referring to the loss of property, and not human life. I know what he meant, and so should you.

 

[DQuaN]

Aplologies. I thought he had quoted it from an article or something like that (compliment to your writing skills). Had I known it was Loud I wouldn't have been nearly as rude.

I would edit my post but you have quoted it so there is not much point.

Again, my apologies LoudMusic.

 

[LoudMusic]

It's all good. And actually I don't believe it was that many people. The number is irrelivant, but I think it was less than half that. Thanks for covering for me Solid (:

 

[Pupik]

LM, I think the accepted proposal was a 1776-foot high building (clever number, dontcha think?), with a park memorial dedicated those whom lost their lives.

As for re-using the steel, I saw a TV bit which stated the weakest link of the girders was not the steel itself, but the bolts (or was it rivets?) used to hold them in the interlocking fashion. The super-hot burning jet fuel melted the rivets/bolts, and that's about all it took to level two bulidings the size of a small town. And with all the contaminants (jet fuel, asbestos, other minute and breathable objects like glass) on the steel, it's highly doubtful it's useful for anything other than melting it down.

It probably will be much what it was before, the landmark buliding(s) in Manhattan with a lot of surrounding shops in the area, and financial buisness in on the main floors.

 

[LoudMusic]

Originally posted by pupik
LM, I think the accepted proposal was a 1776-foot high building (clever number, dontcha think?), with a park memorial dedicated those whom lost their lives.

I've seen that as well but could not find evidence of it with several Google searches

As for re-using the steel, I saw a TV bit which stated the weakest link of the girders was not the steel itself, but the bolts (or was it rivets?) used to hold them in the interlocking fashion. The super-hot burning jet fuel melted the rivets/bolts, and that's about all it took to level two bulidings the size of a small town. And with all the contaminants (jet fuel, asbestos, other minute and breathable objects like glass) on the steel, it's highly doubtful it's useful for anything other than melting it down.

Wow, that really puts it into perspective.

It probably will be much what it was before, the landmark buliding(s) in Manhattan with a lot of surrounding shops in the area, and financial buisness in on the main floors.

I've seen lots of online polls asking if the general public would feel safe near or in a new WTC tower. I'm sure they'll have no problem filling up the biggest building they can put together, and if there are any vacancies you can count me in. Though I understand why people would be hissitant to be associated with a new building of that magnituide - afterall they were attacked on multiple occations.

 

[LoudMusic]

Oh, another thing to note on "big buildings" is there are several ways to classify them. Highest floor, most floors, total feet to roof, total feet to highest point including antenna and spires are the four most common methods. This site uses the last method. I think the 1776' tall WTC replacement tower was to include 100+ feet of spire / antenna, which I personally think is lame. It should be to the roof or some measurement of that magnituide.

One thing I find impressive about that list is number 98. Constructed in 1913 and it's still in the top 100 tallest buildings in the world.

 

[1X83Z]

Originally posted by LoudMusic
Maybe the best thing to do with the site is to convert it into one giant memorial.

We have a 'no saying this' policy in my apartment.

My logic is this: we've got about forty million parks in Manhattan as it stands. Battery Park, which is probably a few times larger than the World Trade Center site, is about 2000 feet from the towers to the south and about 100 feet from the towers to the west. There's a cemetery a block from the towers (on Wall St & Broadway) with a park to its north, and there's a small park off the West Side Highway (or whatever we're supposed to call it downtown - West Street, or the Joe DiMaggio Highway, or some ****).

Within 4000 feet of the World Trade Center site, I can name for you twelve seperate parks, and within one mile I can name about six more (including that freaking parkway that starts in Chinatown and ends about seven blocks away in the East Village). And of course, Central Park, the largest park ever created, takes up all of the city above 59th St (I realise it ends at some point, but the ending is in Harlem, so what's the point?).

Therefore, the only memorial I'll agree to, as a Financial District resident and worker, is one that involves a freaking huge building, in which I'll gladly agree to rent office space.

You know, an entire ZIP code (and more office space than available in the entire city of Cleveland) was destroyed on September 11.

 

[X5.]

Some taller twin towers should be made, with anti-air missiles positioned on top, this time it should be taller than the Sears Towers and the Petronas Towers(Kuala Lumpar). I would love to see that d**k, Osama after the Twin Towers are resurrected to their full might.

I agree 100percent with you M5power, no memorial, there are plenty of parks around.
they could turn the ground where the plane went down in Pittsburgh into a memorial instead.