REBUILD THE TWIN TOWERS!
“A suitable memorial will be erected, but the two loved and admired towers should be rebuilt,” says former New York City Mayor Ed Koch.
Several top American architects, such as Philip Johnson and Robert A.M. Stern, say the towers should be rebuilt to show that America cannot be defeated.
“It is important to build,” says Stern. “The skyscraper is one of the great American creations… We have always expressed our confidence through tall buildings. We are still a brash, new, swaggering country, and we must still explore the imaginative possibilities of height.”
There’s a practical reason to rebuild as well. The assault on the World Trade Center knocked out nearly 20 percent of lower Manhattan’s office space, according to a report by Salomon Smith Barney. For the city to regain its economic vitality, that business space must be rebuilt.
TOWERS OF LIGHT
As the debate goes on, a team of artists with Creative Time, Inc. and The Municipal Art Society of New York is already working on a temporary memorial that would shoot powerful light beams into the New York skyline to form a ghostly image of the towers’ forms.
The Creative Time Web site explains, “The beacons will at once echo the World Trade Center Towers and serve as a votive candle in memory of lives lost while giving presence to the ongoing and heroic relief efforts downtown.” |
