I'm not sure how many floors the skyscraper has, but if the podium really has 19, like everyone is saying, the tower has 105 stories.

http://img192.imageshack.us/img192/6431/28cndfreedom54505vg.jpg

http://mysite.verizon.net/vze26pnp/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderpictures/FT2005c.jpg


http://www.earthcam.net/users/interface.php?id=445&projectid=202&clientid=158

http://www.files.bz/files/5428/FT111.jpg
http://www.files.bz/files/5428/FT222.jpg
http://www.files.bz/files/5428/FT333.jpg
http://www.files.bz/files/5428/FT444.jpg

The other towers are still being designed and small changes will be made to Freedom Tower.

Ebola do you know exactly what changes will be made to the Freedom Tower?

I also heard a rumor that the reported height of 1776 feet is a fake data and the tower will be taller than 1776 feet when its finished .I read it in a german newspaper in combinatuion with the secret real height from Burj Dubai.

Did someone have further information about this?

The spire and 200 foot base will be changed, and that's all I know. The other four towers are still being designed, so it's still too early to say anything about them. As for the height of FT, I don't know because I do recall reading somewhere that the Freedom Tower was redesigned to beat the BD, but that was a long time ago and I doubt they will be going crazy with the height if they can't even get the memorial right. If any info like that leaked, everyone would be all over it. If they did change the height, I doubt that they would tell anyone anyway. Also, Silverstein just said it would be the world's tallest, but I bet he means that it will be completed before the one in Dubai.

its going to be one of the most beautiful WTB even though im not totally convinced about its huge spire, an unfair but nice trick to become much taller...... but who cares, Petronas towers and Taipei101 use it and look all the way nice just as 7US will !!!

I like the colors on the base of tower 7, if the FT has to have that base it wouldnt be so bade with that lighting.

that first rendering with the city is mad old. It gives you the idea of it all, but those 4 slanted towers around it are history, all being redone with separate architects for each, and all at least 1,000 ft tall. I just picture all the other towers that are u/c right now into that picture, like NYT, Beekman, Orion, GS, BOA, renovated Verizon building, and countless residentials.

Cool a new thread....hopefully in this one there will be more construction pics.

It will be probally thread 5 before anything happens.

i remember a kid saying something about how chicago is gonna have more 1000 footers than new york i guess hes wrong now

Dont they already?

^^ Currently, yes: Chicago has more thousand footers.
However, once the project is done, that could change. :?

I really think the architecture and the building itself is really modern and nice but I don't think it belongs to NYC and especially in that part...Too modern compared to all the other buildings...

Might look like this:

http://img159.imageshack.us/img159/184/17jo2.jpg

^^that looks good, but why don't they stop being little a-holes and just add another tower same height as FT, but without the spire.

Well Chicago has 4 1,000 footers right now, 2 under contruction and one 2,000 foot tower that should start next year. Not sure what New York will have or does have. There are 2 right now right?

All those wannabies towers around it badly need a major redesign work.

Well again, those aren't actual designs. I believe Foster is doing one tower, so that will be spectacular.

All those wannabies towers around it badly need a major redesign work.

hah yeah every what it should be like render has slanted roof towers!

I hope the final design would be without the pointed antenna, looks so out of place. New York is a premier city, build a real skyscraper and with occupied floor of above 500 metres. Hope the final design would not be the one in the render.

I hope the final design would be without the pointed antenna, looks so out of place. New York is a premier city, build a real skyscraper and with occupied floor of above 500 metres. Hope the final design would not be the one in the render.

So the design of FT on the renders above isn't the final design or do you mean the other towers around the FT?

^^that looks good, but why don't they stop being little a-holes and just add another tower same height as FT, but without the spire.
True that , true that :)

So the design of FT on the renders above isn't the final design or do you mean the other towers around the FT?


The design you see in all of the official renders, for Freedom Tower, and all of the other towers, is not final; I'm not sure when an updated render will be released.

get rid of the spire and make it 2000 to roof and have 4 1200 footers

I don't get why they don't have Twins either,

If your going to construct 4 other buildings each around 1200 feet Why not have one of them that equals the Rooftop of the Freedom tower?

We will have the twins back and even that redesigned.

It looks like a gigantic monument with those 4 smaller (but still huge) scrapers surrounding Freedom Tower, each roof pointing towards it.´
The Freedom Tower itself could be bigger, but I really like the concept.

get rid of the spire and make it 2000 to roof and have 4 1200 footers

Yes that is what i like!!That would be great if they build something in this height range.

But they should keep the spiral concept by Daniel Libeskind.

:) N.Y.C build higher than expected!!!!!!!!!

The design you see in all of the official renders, for Freedom Tower, and all of the other towers, is not final; I'm not sure when an updated render will be released.

Thanks for your information.And please post all new renders you found.

It is too modern and tall for NYC...I mean NYC has all old and sames syled buildings and now they are building this modern tall building that will outburst and destroy all the buildings beside it..I j ust don't think it is that nice for this city...For some modern cities yes but for NYC I don't know doesn't look natural...

^^^ dumbest shit ever.

^^^ dumbest shit ever.
:hilarious :hilarious lol

Does NYC suddenly have to exbibit only short buildings from now on?

I don't think so! :mad2:

We had the tallest, now we are going to get them back (and instead of two, we may wind up with five).

Way to go Osama and Family of the victims.
You guys destroyed our twins, we will get 'em back, more than double in density! :hilarious

It is too modern and tall for NYC...I mean NYC has all old and sames syled buildings and now they are building this modern tall building that will outburst and destroy all the buildings beside it..I j ust don't think it is that nice for this city...For some modern cities yes but for NYC I don't know doesn't look natural...
You can't have a city look like a museum with old stuff and nothing else. The whole thing about NYC is the variety of buildings of all the different styles of skyscrapers imaginable.

get rid of the spire and make it 2000 to roof and have 4 1200 footers

Huh? It would be RenCen on steroids!!!

It is too modern and tall for NYC...I mean NYC has all old and sames syled buildings and now they are building this modern tall building that will outburst and destroy all the buildings beside it..I j ust don't think it is that nice for this city...For some modern cities yes but for NYC I don't know doesn't look natural...

I can understand where you are coming from but i don't think the Freedom Tower will stick out like a saw thumb in the skyline. I think it's a good thing that modern skyscrapers are being built, what would be the point in building new skyscrapers that are similar in style to other buildings in New York, it would be completely unoriginal and be very boring. It's all about symbolising progress and bringing the city into a new era of well engineered and modern skyscrapers. You wouldn't want New York to be left behind would you?

I don't what it is about this design though, it just doesn't seem to have much character, it's lacking something. Is it a building that you New Yorkers out there will be proud of?

Well Chicago has 4 1,000 footers right now, 2 under contruction and one 2,000 foot tower that should start next year. Not sure what New York will have or does have. There are 2 right now right?

NYC 1,000: ESB, Chrysler, Freedom Tower, BOA, NYT, and the 3 other WTC towers, thats 8.

Chicago 1,000: Sears, Hancock, Trump, Aon, Waterview, AT&T, and maybe Fordham, that still has a long way. 6 maybe 7.

Does NYC suddenly have to exbibit only short buildings from now on?

I don't think so! :mad2:

We had the tallest, now we are going to get them back (and instead of two, we may wind up with five).

Way to go Osama and Family of the victims.
You guys destroyed our twins, we will get 'em back, more than double in density! :hilarious
Don't throw a tantrum just yet, b/c it might just end by September if the NJ side doesn't make a full agreement.

I highly doubt that that's Freedom Tower steel. I wonder what they're doing and where that came from, and also why.

http://img347.imageshack.us/img347/2138/gg6mj.jpg

i saw that too, i think they took apart something. I don't know what though.

NYC 1,000: ESB, Chrysler, Freedom Tower, BOA, NYT, and the 3 other WTC towers, thats 8.

Chicago 1,000: Sears, Hancock, Trump, Aon, Waterview, AT&T, and maybe Fordham, that still has a long way. 6 maybe 7.

New York Times is a cheap one tho and BOA is sort of.

Huh? It would be RenCen on steroids!!!

That would be very powerful, being from Detroit i can tell you the Rencen is very immpressive you just have to look at it you can tell its some huge company, something sort of like the what future citys look like in the movies with a huge tower dwarfing the rest, it gets your point across.

It is too modern and tall for NYC...I mean NYC has all old and sames syled buildings and now they are building this modern tall building that will outburst and destroy all the buildings beside it..I j ust don't think it is that nice for this city...For some modern cities yes but for NYC I don't know doesn't look natural...

Whats Peace Tree like? My family wants to move there and in the pictures all they show is old people diving golf karts and these high schools kids getting off the bus that look very square.

Instead of that cluster of 300m+ towers around the FT, why not just give the FT a twin?

Everyone's thinking it, why don't they just do it.

That way everyone gets the twins back and you still get the office space.

The other thing, lose the spire, it looks ghastly, spires can look awesome but not on flat tops.

Beautiful memorial for WTC.

New York Times is a cheap one tho and BOA is sort of.

so is Fordham, its a 2,000 foot SPIRE, touche.

so is Fordham, its a 2,000 foot SPIRE, touche.

A spire that is 50m thick (i.e. not a spire, more of a tower-like figure but still a building w/ stuff in it). There is a 120m spire on top.
I obviously have no sense of humor.
Touche!
edit: I do realize its called Fordham Spire

Instead of that cluster of 300m+ towers around the FT, why not just give the FT a twin?

Everyone's thinking it, why don't they just do it.

That way everyone gets the twins back and you still get the office space.

The other thing, lose the spire, it looks ghastly, spires can look awesome but not on flat tops.
Because they already said, no twins, of any kind

What i wanna know, is what the hell is wrong with ppl that come on this site protesssssssst nimbyism and then when ny is brought up they mention how the skyline shouldn't be evolving.

Cant any get some pics from ground level? I would but I am few 1000 miles away.

edit

I dont Mind The design as is, Yes, it needs a little touch up but im just happy that there actually rebuilding now after so long.. its like healing a scar on the country. lets just hope the bandaids are nice. i dont know if u guys have addressed this but, i remember a while back seeing that they were going to position the buildings so that every sept. 11th a shawdow of some sort would alluminate
the memorial.
is that still in the works or no?

I dont Mind The design as is, Yes, it needs a little touch up but im just happy that there actually rebuilding now after so long.. its like healing a scar on the country. lets just hope the bandaids are nice. i dont know if u guys have addressed this but, i remember a while back seeing that they were going to position the buildings so that every sept. 11th a shawdow of some sort would alluminate
the memorial.
is that still in the works or no?

Yes you are right that they finally begin to rebuild ground zero.But they should't build anything there it shoul be a new wonder of the world to honour those who died there.For example the tallest towers in the world!

The thing with the shadow was Daniel Libeskinds "wedge of light" idea and there should't be a shadow but a game of light.
it should work so.
at (8:48 am) as the first plain hit the northtower the light of the sun should hit the tower 2
at (9:03 am) as the second plain hit the south tower the light of the sun should hit the station
at at (10:04) am as the south tower collapsed the light shoul hit the memorial and the 11.September place
and at (10:28) am as the second tower collapsed the sunlight should move up to Freedom Towers peak.

I don't know exactly if it still work because the whole design changed and the buildings where deplaced so i think it don't works anymore.If someone knows it better please post and correct my mistakes to have the right information in the forum.

If it still works it would be fantastic to see it once live!!!! :)

I think the whole thing with the light during different times of the days died with the old version of Freedom Tower, but I could be wrong.

What i wanna know, is what the hell is wrong with ppl that come on this site protesssssssst nimbyism and then when ny is brought up they mention how the skyline shouldn't be evolving.
You have your say as other have theirs.

^^^ dumbest shit ever.
Yep, so true. The skyscrapers that made New York famous since the 30's stamped right over the previous building generations. To make new daring statements today, we have to do the same thing, to a degree at least. Conformity does not produce leadership.

You have your say as other have theirs.

most people on this site couldnt make sense with a ten dollar bill.



that being said, hows the tower coming?

That still doesn't mean that you have the right to attack them for opposing it.

[QUOTE=Spooky873]most people on this site couldnt make sense with a ten dollar bill.[QUOTE]
I dont get it?

I prefer this design to twin towers. I like the design: have a supertall much taller than the twins, one about the size of the twins and and two more still really tall buildings but shorter than the twins. Why reconstruct what was there before, I think change is better... give a proper memorial, but put things behind and move one.

I never noticed the pics at the bottom of the first post. theyre new, and they look fuckin great.

i read somewhere that the base is actually not going to look like a damn bunker. i forget where, but itll look different from the rest of the tower, just not 'bunkerish'.

it looks like they are getting ready to tare down that basement. Finally! :cheers:

UPDATE: I just read that the workers will be readying for the column foundations in a few days.

"Test blasts are to be set off Monday, weather permitting. They will be followed by about 56 blasts to loosen the rock. Three or four blasts will occur about every other day, Monday through Friday, between 10 a.m. and 3 p.m., over the next two months."

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/08/nyregion/08freedom.html

excellent...

That part which I think is the remainings of the old WTC garage, covers the PATH
tracks that head back to Newark. So I think that part will remain there and the workers
will cover that up sometime later.

hey daquan hows skyscraperpage? ahahah

http://www.ny1.com/ny1/content/index.jsp?stid=1&aid=60125 This explains the blasting stuff.

Wow, so they're really building this thing? How sad. :(


I hope I can learn to like it.

I love it.

http://www.files.bz/files/5428/FT444.jpg

mmm so do i.

can you believe that hk thug thread? :ohno: they dont know how american they are over there, hahahaha.

http://www.files.bz/files/5428/FT444.jpg


:cheers: :cheers: :cheers:

great render

I like it.
Better than that other heap of crap.

omg, that red colour suits the tower perfectly, hope they can put it on every other tower lol.

^^ They should keep it uniformed with the primary color of the ESB

^^^That would look great.

I love it.

http://www.files.bz/files/5428/FT444.jpg

Will this tower really look like this render?
It`s like the old twin tower appearence but with the freedom-tower design.
If it will really look like this, it would be great. Let`s hope that they finish this tower as seen in this pic!

I love it.

http://www.files.bz/files/5428/FT444.jpg

So do i!

Will this tower really look like this render?
It`s like the old twin tower appearence but with the freedom-tower design.
If it will really look like this, it would be great. Let`s hope that they finish this tower as seen in this pic!

Yes, it looks like this.

The tower is already under construction.

nice! :cool:

why always their buidlings like that .. they have to create a special design .. *_^

Very nice!

why always their buidlings like that .. they have to create a special design .. *_^

huh?

why always their buidlings like that .. they have to create a special design .. *_^

...right


Back on subject, I agree that render with the red spire looks amazing. It looks really bad ass and evil kind of like the Sears tower :rock:

Freedom Tower, Again Uncertain

New York Observer
June 13, 2006 11:08 AM

Port Authority Chairman Anthony Coscia resurrected doubts about the Freedom Tower's future at a Crain's breakfast this morning, six weeks after April's sunny announcement which transferred ownership of the Freedom Tower from Silverstein Properties to the bi-state transportation agency.

"The agreement contemplates that we will go between now and September and we will decide whether or not we have the kind of leases for that building which make it a financially viable project," Coscia said.

Coscia did not specify what would happen if those leases were not signed. "It is possible at that stage we would rethink the project," he said, when asked whether the tower would be scaled back. Port Authority official told The Real Estate later that the tower would be built--the question was whether it would attain its 1,776-foot height.

Coscia also said that the construction underway that would bring the tower up to grade should continue.

None of the publicity surrounding the April's agreement with Silverstein Properties even hinted that securing 1 million square feet in leases from government entities would be a problem. Coscia, while saying that negotiating with the federal government is slow, said, "We are pleased with the progress to date and I am optimistic that by September we will have leases."

Optimistic? If this is something you need to be optimistic about, how do things look if you are realistic?

-Matthew Schuerman

http://therealestate.observer.com/2006/06/freedom-tower-again-uncertain.html

why always their buidlings like that .. they have to create a special design .. *_^

not to mention all EMIRATI Scrapers have weird designs.

^^ .. i didn't say it is awful :) and it is just an opinion in end ^_*

To be honest, I don't like the spire red like that, it looks covered in blood or something so definitely don't think it's right.

i found some more LIVE webcams from the WTC site http://www.earthcam.com/usa/newyork/groundzero/index.php?cam=1

^^ .. i didn't say it is awful :) and it is just an opinion in end ^_*

^_* ? Unhappy person with a black eye that somehow had his other eye removed and replaced with a triangle, what does that have to do with FT?

^^^ hahahahahahahahahah

It's great to see something back there, though I'd like to see its twin sibling next to it, just for the old good days, but with an improved design.

I hope also the underground resembles the old one (of course with state of the art features) with all those subway-PATH lines convergence, the mall, etc.

To be honest, I don't like the spire red like that, it looks covered in blood or something so definitely don't think it's right.

I hear ya, the spire will most likely have changeable colors like the Empire state building.

well it still looks cool to me, better than the FAA lights.

^_* ? Unhappy person with a black eye that somehow had his other eye removed and replaced with a triangle, what does that have to do with FT?


:lol: ..

^_* hmm

must be the new anime?

^^ ^_^ nope .. but it is interesting thing when u express ur emotions by using these things ;) ..

we r out off the topic *_* .. lol

Looks splendid at night!

Anyone been to Cedar Point? I hope it's like the lighting on Millienium Force.

funny you say something, i was actually supposed to go with my friends this past weekend. i havent been in a couple years, ive been twice. its awesome.

New York just OKed tax-exempt debt for the three new WTC towers, the Freedom Tower blasting gets a thumbs-up, and Pataki sez he's confident Freedom Tower will be built as planned

New York just OKed tax-exempt debt for the three new WTC towers, the Freedom Tower blasting gets a thumbs-up, and Pataki sez he's confident Freedom Tower will be built as planned


really? have a link?

anyone know what happened to the GZ webcams? I tried to view them but they are all down. http://www.earthcam.com/usa/newyork/groundzero/index.php?cam=1

The design its starting to grow on me.

lets see how its gonna turn out...hopefully it'll fit in

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/14/nyregion/14rebuild.html
Freedom Tower Is in Doubt, Port Authority Chief Warns

By CHARLES V. BAGLI
Published: June 14, 2006

Although work is under way on the foundation of the Freedom Tower, a top official cast new doubt yesterday on whether the signature skyscraper's steel frame would ever rise above street level.

The 1,776-foot high tower will have to be reconsidered if state officials fail to obtain leases for one million square feet from federal agencies by September, Anthony R. Coscia, the chairman of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, told a breakfast forum sponsored by Crain's New York Business.

Mr. Coscia has made similar statements before, but this was his most explicit warning to date, with the fifth anniversary of Sept. 11 soon approaching. Also yesterday, Senator Charles E. Schumer called on the two dozen insurers at ground zero to make good on their commitments to provide a total of $4.6 billion for rebuilding at the World Trade Center site.

Larry Silverstein, the developer who leased the trade center six weeks before 9/11, warned last month that some insurers were indicating they might cite a new plan put together by state and city officials to renege on their obligations. "Business-as-usual tactics like talking tough, threatening litigation and stalling are just not acceptable when it comes to rebuilding ground zero," Mr. Schumer said in a statement. "We have a plan to move forward. What we don't have is explicit certainty from all the relevant insurance companies that they will make the payouts necessary to finance rebuilding."

Both men's comments raised new questions about the Freedom Tower, a project long promoted by Gov. George E. Pataki, who leaves office in December.

The project has been criticized by some real estate executives and civic leaders, who have called it too big, in the wrong location and unlikely to attract corporate tenants. The Democratic nominee for governor, Eliot Spitzer, has expressed concern that it could turn into "a white elephant."

Under the latest arrangement at ground zero, Mr. Silverstein would build three towers on the site, but he surrendered the most financially troublesome project, the 2.6-million-square-foot Freedom Tower. Mr. Coscia, in turn, agreed that the Port Authority would build it, but only if it were financially feasible.

To get the project on a sound footing, the Pataki administration agreed in April to contribute $250 million and to round up leases for one million square feet from federal agencies — at market rates of up to $50 a square foot — by September. Those leases would allow the authority to get a mortgage, which, combined with $970 million in insurance proceeds, would cover most of the cost of the building.

Mr. Coscia, who said he remained hopeful, did not indicate specifically what would happen if the federal leases fail to materialize by September, although the tower's opponents hope a new governor will abandon it. Mr. Coscia said that the foundation work for the tower would have to be done anyway to bring the site up to street level.

"I think there's every reason to be optimistic that the state will get the leases," Deputy Mayor Daniel L. Doctoroff said. "Coscia's just sounding the bell to remind people that we've got to get this done."

State officials also expressed confidence. "The Freedom Tower will serve as a testament to our resiliency as a people, a city and a country and will reclaim our city's skyline," said Joanna Rose, a spokeswoman for the governor.

Mr. Coscia also told the breakfast forum that the Port Authority was willing to take on construction of the 9/11 memorial as long as there is a financial plan for the project. The estimated cost of the memorial has swelled to $1 billion, but a report to Mr. Pataki due tomorrow is expected to outline a series of alternatives for a memorial that would stay within a $500 million budget.

"There should be an understanding of where all the money necessary to build the memorial is coming from and also a plan for its operating expense going forward," Mr. Coscia said. "I don't think the Port Authority should be responsible for cost overruns. I don't think we should be responsible for covering operating expenses."

So the Freedom Tower could be smaller than the actuall design or what?

So the Freedom Tower could be smaller than the actuall design or what?
I hope not.

If they decide to change the plan, I hope they decide to make it taller.

Let's see here...

We need an observation deck (the annual revenue alone should finance the building).

We also need Windows on the World back at the top, so we can dine with a view

Bottom line, build it as soon as possible so the revenue can start coming in. http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y217/mr-fish/Miscellaneous/BigSmile.gif

If they decide to change the plan, I hope they decide to make it taller.

Let's see here...

We need an observation deck (the annual revenue alone should finance the building).

We also need Windows on the World back at the top, so we can dine with a view

Bottom line, build it as soon as possible so the revenue can start coming in. http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y217/mr-fish/Miscellaneous/BigSmile.gif

You are right we need both oppurtunitys back in N.Y.C and its a pity that the roof will have the same height as the former twin towers had. :( Also in my opinion it is a total nonesens to build a building 1776 feet to symbolise the independance who can ever see that the building is 1776 feet tall? And the impact of Freedom Tower isn't so big if the surrounding buildindgs will have nearly the same roofheight as the FT. So build it higher please.And i am really annoyed about the talkings of security, they should build it so that everyone in the building if an attack occurs have enough time to leave the building.They can build it saver than any other scraper around the world but if someone wants to destroy it again than ,it will happen again. And it is sure that someone will die if an attack occurs, they cant save everyone. The base looks like a bunker to me. The tower schould symbolise FREEDOM and not a stronghold! They should build the former FT tower with the twisting but a little bit taller for example 500m to roof and 630m to the peak of the antenna.

i would still love to see the twin towers be rebuilt. The chances are small but it looks like the chances of the freedom tower being built are getting smaller by the day.

What about make a huge casino inside the building, to attract all the people, and make the building alive..

The Freedom Tower IS being built, and there is no way in hell that the ultra-stressed height of 1,776 feet will be lowered; the blasting just got a green light, along with the demolition of the damaged Deutsche Bank Building, which will make room for a fifth tower. Construction of the Triplet Towers will start as soon as the sites are made available. I'm pretty sure that the three towers will all be over 900 feet.

Are they demolishing the Deutsche Bank building or deconstructing it?

They're deconstructing 130 Liberty. The EPA finally stopped complaining. They are supposed to start in July.

What about make a huge casino inside the building, to attract all the people, and make the building alive..

Putting a casino in a building that is already caused enough havok amongst families of victims, their friends, pets, so forth...

it would bring the shitstorm of all shitstorms. no more bad press and protests that would delay this even further. lets sweep that one under the rug

Also, it is probably ilegal to have casinos in Manhattan.

http://www.renewnyc.com/WebCamImages/pic06061916595900.jpg check it out, they built a crane. Maybe they will tear down that basement now.

Thanks for an update

wow - things are happening!!!

http://www.renewnyc.com/WebCamImages/pic06061919595900.jpg

Go Freedom Crane!

http://www.renewnyc.com/WebCamImages/pic06061922595900.jpg

And Poland Spring Water, the official drink of the LMDC.

i would still love to see the twin towers be rebuilt. The chances are small but it looks like the chances of the freedom tower being built are getting smaller by the day.



So you can explain the crane at the site and all those articles saying 'Freedom Tower Under Construction' how...?

Testing Message

lets hope the freedom tower does get above street level

So you can explain the crane at the site and all those articles saying 'Freedom Tower Under Construction' how...?
That crane is for taking about the basement that is there, and you can notice that it's not a kangaroo crane, which is used for constructing skyscrapers. That article that I posted from the NY Times has been known for drawing speculations on if it really will be built or not. For the next three months we will not know what the PA's final answer will be until then.

So there is the possibility that they will unveil a total new Ft design again?????

^^ this is getting stupid! i wish they would just build the damn thing

^^ this is getting stupid! i wish they would just build the damn thing

Yes of course it is stupid!!!!!!!But its a pity that they plan for about 4 years and that ugly result comes out.N.Y dont build that FT build a more spectacular one and a HIGHER ONE!!!!!!This one just looks like the architects were too lazy to design a brilliant gloryios new icon for N.Y!!!!!!!!:(

there should just be one massive poll where people vote for either freedom tower or new twin towers.

there should just be one massive poll where people vote for either freedom tower or new twin towers.

Thats a damm good idea.I cant believe that new yorkers and the victims family members are glad to see that thing going up.

i don't think most New Yorkers want the freedom tower

The Freedom Tower will make ane extrodanary augment to the cities much needed skyline

im one who does.

But why they dont build it more spectacular.Libeskinds ideas were good, Fosters twin tower concept was brilliant but NO!!!Silverstein let Childs to make a proposal and what comes out SHIT.Commerce architecture made by David Childs what else?And with a height of nearly 420m to roof only 69 floors????ßPlease.

why don't they just make 2 freedom towers?

why don't they just make 2 freedom towers?
that's a good idea.

But why they dont build it more spectacular.Libeskinds ideas were good, Fosters twin tower concept was brilliant but NO!!!Silverstein let Childs to make a proposal and what comes out SHIT.Commerce architecture made by David Childs what else?And with a height of nearly 420m to roof only 69 floors????ßPlease.


82 floors, 69 office on top of 6 mechanical floors with another 7 multi purpose floors above.


Highest office- Foor 75 ~ 1140 feet (347m)

Highest Floors- 82~ 1320 feet (402m)


Some other good news is that the buildings official name is still 1 WTC, Freedom Tower is mainly just a media hype. (A really bad one)

There are numerous factors that play a role in the development of the new WTC besides how 'cool' and 'spectacular' the Freedom Tower looks. There are specs, regulations and security guidelines that must be followed to build, especially in New York City. Most important of all is the market for real estate in Lower Manhattan. The amount of inhabitable floors and square footage per floor for any office building are closely studied and optimized for the trends and predictions of the market. Twin Towers II? How easy do you think it'll be for Silverstein to sell office lots on a resurrected set of the twin towers? Would you want to work there? On the floors where the airliner hit? I don't think so. These people aren't idiots. They know what they're doing. They're professionals. There are reasons why the redevelopment plan looks the way it does.

As for Child's FT design... I think it blends in perfectly with the neighboring structures with its simplicity and symmetry. For the height freaks out there, how retarded would a 2000 footer look in lower manhattan? It just wouldn't blend in. Someone should make a render of that to show how impractical and ridiculous a 2000ft office buliding would look in that area.

^^ good post. Hopefully that will shut up some of these lame naysayers

that two tower shit isnt gonna happen mex. im not against it, but ive accepted it. the renders ive seen on post #1 i thought were awesome. take a look. im glad to see no one tower will look the same as well. foster, the guy who designed hearst, is designing one of them. now you know thats gonna be a sight to see.

The tower will look gorgeous I think. The surropunding towers aren't as spectacular and a redesign is the only option for them... I dont understand why people don't like the tower.

Because not everything what can be called highrise is at the same time beautiful.

One of SSP's forumers is connected with SOM, According to him the spire will be beefed up enough that there will be levels inside of it, ontop of the 82 story office building.


Crane of 1 World Trade Center, Courtesy of Wired New York
http://img147.imageshack.us/img147/1787/wtcsite10c3tc.jpg

So there can be a Observation floor above the outdoor Ob or what?

There won't be an outdoor one according to SOM, There will be an indoor one at ~1300 feet (80th floor probably). The Tower's roof is 1335, Blue glass screens and other mechanical equitment extend to 1368', But the spire will be changed, It will be made thicker. I don't know to what degree but it will be more accessable than most spires which just have a ladder or little staircase in them. I'm excited for the new design.

I got my sources at SSP.

And when will the new design be unveiled?I read i think in the internet that tere will be a indoor and an outdoor ob deck like it was on the former wtc2 building.

And when will the new design be unveiled?I read i think in the internet that tere will be a indoor and an outdoor ob deck like it was on the former wtc2 building.

I bet that it will be let out on July 4 or 5 because that's when the LMDC is releasing info about the future. If not then, perhaps it will be let out in September, with the other designs of the Triplet Towers.

Yes thats possible!They will also unveil a "2010 video" on 5th july on www.lowermanhattan.info .

It would be nice if the spire had levels that you can go into, but thinking logically its probably just a crawlspace and ladder for maintenence issues and such is all. no public access, and would not count as the highest occupied floor

Nice... I'd like to see more floors on a tower this big... but I would imagine that adding some floors to the spire would not change the earlier numbers about the floors underneath that. And that is why I'm still a bit confused... . I am trying to match the text from SOM's site to an elevation image created by SOM (found on wikipedia), while also taking into account data provided by Emporis.com and SkyscraperPage.com.

The text:

The program is organized as follows: Rising from the plaza level, an 80-foot-high public lobby is topped by a series of mechanical floors; together these form the 200-foot-high building base. Sixty-nine office floors rise above the base to 1120 feet elevation. Mechanical floors, two floors to be occupied by the Metropolitan Television Alliance, restaurants and observation decks culminate in an observation deck and glass parapet that mark 1362' and 1368' respectively - the heights of the original Twin Towers. An antenna supported by a cable structure rises to a final height of 1776'.

The picture:

http://i5.tinypic.com/15d1kz6.jpg

In the picture, I see the 1st floor, the 80-foot-high lobby, then I see 4 mechanical floors, and I see that lobby plus mechanical floors are 200 foot high. But then I see 70 dark blue floors going to 1140 feet (not 69 going to 1120 feet). OK, I can explain that by assuming the 70th of those floors (floor 75) is not one of those 69 office floors, but one of the other floors mentioned (one of the MTA, restaurant, or observation decks floors), and if that's the case, I am still following things...

Then follow 5 more mechanical floors and the floor count so far is 1+4+70+5 = 80. But what about on top of that? I would say that those white/yellow floors on top of that are 3 floors (not 2), making the total number of floors 83 (not 82 as both Emporis.com and SkyscraperPage.com give as the number of floors).

Also, I'd say from the picture that there are 5 basement floors (not the 4 SkyscraperPage.com gives). Below the 0 foot marker, there are three basement floors with images of people, but below that are what I would see as two more floors?

From the picture, I count 83 floors and 5 basement floors, not 82 and 4, so I'm seeing one more aboveground floor and one more belowground floor. Is the image an older design? Is there some convention that I don't know about that makes me count those 2 extra floors when I shouldn't? Are Emporis and/or SkyscraperPage wrong? I realise that this is a tower that has not yet been constructed, so until it is finished, nothing is really official, but I'm just trying to resolve what seems to me like conflicting information coming even from the same source.

Thanks for explaining this to me. :)

Damn!! The Lobby podium hall looks good!

As an aside note, from this detailed image, it can also be calculated pretty accurately that the top floor will be (or would have been, in case the spire is redesigned to have some more floors) at 1319 ft / 402.0 m.

And so it begins........

http://www.pathrestoration.com/drp/images/gallery/wtcth/2006/05/FreedomTwr01.jpg


http://www.pathrestoration.com/drp/images/gallery/wtcth/2006/05/FreedomTwr05.jpg


http://www.pathrestoration.com/drp/images/gallery/wtcth/2006/05/FreedomTwr03.jpg

fantastic! lets get this baby movin! love the design.
i worked out this tower is 62.5m wide, is that about how wide former WTC were?
thanks

Well, that's 205 feet, and the twin towers were 200 feet, I think, so not exactly. I am sure that Freedom Tower is as tall (to roof) as the Twin Towers, plus the spire. I can't wait for steel. I'm also excited about the Triplet Towers and that fifth tower.

great news !!! now it started construction !!!

And they're off!!!

whats that white and blue machine? and btw thanks for the pics.

Well, that's 205 feet, and the twin towers were 200 feet, I think, so not exactly. I am sure that Freedom Tower is as tall (to roof) as the Twin Towers, plus the spire. I can't wait for steel. I'm also excited about the Triplet Towers and that fifth tower.



The Towers were 210 feet

^Then Freedom Tower's 210 feet.

In the picture, I see the 1st floor, the 80-foot-high lobby, then I see 4 mechanical floors, and I see that lobby plus mechanical floors are 200 foot high. But then I see 70 dark blue floors going to 1140 feet (not 69 going to 1120 feet). OK, I can explain that by assuming the 70th of those floors (floor 75) is not one of those 69 office floors, but one of the other floors mentioned (one of the MTA, restaurant, or observation decks floors), and if that's the case, I am still following things...

Then follow 5 more mechanical floors and the floor count so far is 1+4+70+5 = 80. But what about on top of that? I would say that those white/yellow floors on top of that are 3 floors (not 2), making the total number of floors 83 (not 82 as both Emporis.com and SkyscraperPage.com give as the number of floors).

Also, I'd say from the picture that there are 5 basement floors (not the 4 SkyscraperPage.com gives). Below the 0 foot marker, there are three basement floors with images of people, but below that are what I would see as two more floors?

From the picture, I count 83 floors and 5 basement floors, not 82 and 4, so I'm seeing one more aboveground floor and one more belowground floor. Is the image an older design? Is there some convention that I don't know about that makes me count those 2 extra floors when I shouldn't? Are Emporis and/or SkyscraperPage wrong? I realise that this is a tower that has not yet been constructed, so until it is finished, nothing is really official, but I'm just trying to resolve what seems to me like conflicting information coming even from the same source.

Thanks for explaining this to me. :)


The very top one is not a floor but a glass screen.

There are 70 blue floors, but since there are 5 below it, the offices reach the 75th floor.

1140 feet is the height to the TOP of the 76th floor, The floorplate of the 75th floor is ~1125 feet.

As of now, The spire is the biggest mystery, We don't know how accessable it will be, But it will be beefed up to about as wide as ESB's mast, going to 1776 feet. So yes, this tower will be a true 1776 footer :cheers:

Hope that straightens things out. :)

Wow! Where did you hear that the spire would be massive? I've heard a lot about the new changes to Freedom Tower, but nothing about the spire.

^Skyscraperpage, Read around there, I'm not a member but it's fun to read and good info. :)


^Then Freedom Tower's 210 feet.


Correct.

http://smiliestation.de/smileys/Gemischt/273.gif (http://smiliestation.de)http://smiliestation.de/smileys/Gemischt/103.gif (http://smiliestation.de)http://smiliestation.de/smileys/Gemischt/443.gif (http://smiliestation.de)http://smiliestation.de/smileys/Kaos/24.gif (http://smiliestation.de)http://smiliestation.de/smileys/Party/38.gif (http://smiliestation.de)
Ready for take off http://smiliestation.de/smileys/Sport/66.gif (http://smiliestation.de)

whats that white and blue machine? and btw thanks for the pics.

I believe that machine is for driving test piles. I could be wrong though, anyone know for sure? Might even be taking soil core samples.

i don't understand. How can they start the construction when the final design is not yet confirmed?

Maybe the design of the underground section of the building is finished and or not relevant for smaller design changes.And i am sure that they will stick with the site where they start to build it.I am amazed about how big the changings will be.

awesome! i wanna see it rising already

Very eerie seeing the old parking spaces in this picture...

http://www.pathrestoration.com/drp/images/gallery/wtcth/2006/05/FreedomTwr03.jpg

Oh, I'd hate to burst anyone's bubble, but I think that big crane was removed; I'm pretty sure that it was only used to remove Freedom Tower's cornerstone from the site.

anyone got a link to that webcam? the good one where you can zoom in and out.

Oh, I'd hate to burst anyone's bubble, but I think that big crane was removed; I'm pretty sure that it was only used to remove Freedom Tower's cornerstone from the site.
yeah, you're probably right. that crane looked a little too flimsy to be used for anything more than removing the cornerstone from the site.

It was just for removing the cornerstone, and other little things, but that can be considered 'site clearing' or 'indirect construction' if anyone wants to feel better. ;)

i don't understand. How can they start the construction when the final design is not yet confirmed?

Because they always design things with some additional tolerance. After all, it would not be very smart to design a building to be a certain height, weight, and so on, without having some tolerance. Imagine a building that was designed to be strong enough to be, say, 100 floors, but not strong enough, maybe, to support 101 floors. Would you feel safe in a building that could support exactly 100 floors but was not considered safe enough if the weight of one floor were added to that?

So they have some leeway. And they can start construction and make changes along the way. After all, from the moment they start construction until finish, they have 3 or 4 years. They can build 50 floors and still have 1 or 2 years to decide exactly what they're going to do at the top of the building.

http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/428611p-361364c.html
Ground Zero mob tie?

Firm banned by city & feds excavating for Freedom Tower

BY GREG B. SMITH
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

A contractor banned by the city and feds for longtime ties to the mob is blasting away bedrock at Ground Zero in the first step toward construction of the Freedom Tower, the Daily News has learned.

In late April, Laquila Construction won a multimillion-dollar job to perform excavation and build the foundation for the highly symbolic tower. The company is using explosives to accelerate the work.

Laquila was hired despite the fact the firm is blackballed by the city and federal governments from bidding on public contracts.

The company's president is under federal indictment on criminal charges of bribing a mob-controlled union so he could use nonunion help on unrelated projects.

The Freedom Tower is being built for the Port Authority by developer Larry Silverstein, with publicly subsidized Liberty Bonds that cut costs.

Silverstein hired Tishman Construction as the general contractor to manage construction of the tower. Tishman, in turn, hired Laquila.

"Laquila came in with the lowest responsible bid, and they're one of the very few firms in this area that has the experience to handle such a complex project," said Silverstein spokesman Bud Perrone.

The company began blasting into Ground Zero bedrock this month, the first step toward completion of the long-awaited Freedom Tower.

Laquila President Dino Tomassetti Sr. was indicted in December 2004 on charges of paying cash bribes to corrupt union officials from 1992 through 2001.

The payments allegedly went to Operating Engineers Locals 14 and 15, two locals the FBI said were infiltrated by members and associates of the Colombo crime family.

Tomassetti pleaded not guilty and has been meeting with prosecutors to discuss a possible plea deal, according to sources familiar with the situation.

Perrone said Laquila was eligible for the Ground Zero job because the firm no longer has any connection to Dino Tomassetti Sr. and was now being run byson Dino Jr.

In March 2004, the city Business Integrity Commission denied Laquila a license to run a waste transfer station because ofwhat it termed evidence that Laquila was "involved in racketeering activity," records show.

The commission cited Laquila's "longtime ties to organized crime" and alleged that the company has repeatedly lied about its connections to gangland figures.

During the trial of ex-mob boss Peter Gotti, an informant testified that Laquila had regularly made payments to the Colombo and Gambino crime families.

Michael (Mikey Scars) DiLeonardo gave testimony that the Laquila firm had been making mob payments from the "early 1990s" through June 2002, when he was arrested.

In June 2005, the Laquila firm was barred indefinitely by the U.S. General Services Administration from bidding on federal contracts because of the indictment of Tomassetti, records show.

Laquila paid a $25,000 fine in 1991 to settle criminal charges in New Jersey that it bribed landfill officials to allow illegal dumping.

In 1990, the city School Construction Authority barred Laquila from bidding on jobs for not mentioning the then-pending Jersey charge. The three-year ban ended in 1993, but the firm has not applied for approval to resume bidding on jobs with the construction authority.

Originally published on June 21, 2006

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/24/nyregion/24freedom.html
With Tower Yet to Rise, Cornerstone Leaves Town

By DAVID W. DUNLAP
Published: June 24, 2006

The 20-ton cornerstone of the Freedom Tower was carted off from the World Trade Center site early yesterday, nearly two years after it was ceremoniously set in place on July 4, with its silvered, chiseled letters proclaiming it a "tribute to the enduring spirit of freedom."

No one made a speech yesterday morning. No one sang "God Bless America." No one read from the Declaration of Independence.

Instead, the cornerstone was placed on a truck and returned to Innovative Stone in Hauppauge, N.Y., where it will remain for as long as two years until it returns to ground zero.

About 6:30 a.m., the five-and-a-half-foot-high block of Adirondack granite was hoisted by crane from its place near the temporary PATH terminal, said Mel Ruffini, a senior vice president of the Tishman Construction Corporation, which is building the Freedom Tower for Silverstein Properties on behalf of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

Then it was lowered onto a flatbed truck and covered in a tarp. By 7:15, it was rolling up the long ramp out of the ground zero pit, headed for Innovative Stone on Long Island, where it had been cut, honed, polished and inscribed in 2004. It arrived safely three hours later, said Karen Pearse, the chief executive at Innovative.

The cornerstone will be kept there in a plexiglass case, viewable by appointment.

"It needs to be repositioned to make sense in the new building," said David Worsley, a senior vice president and the director of construction at Silverstein Properties.

When the Freedom Tower was redesigned last year because of security concerns, the cornerstone's location was rendered obsolete. The architects shifted the building's edge about 40 feet to the west, leaving the cornerstone standing outside the bounds of the reconfigured tower.

But stand it did, protected under a blue plywood enclosure, while the tower project faced delay after delay.

Its absence carries a couple of meanings. Obviously, it is an acknowledgment that much of what passed for progress at ground zero to date has been longer on symbolism than on substance.

On the other hand, with the cornerstone gone, the foundation subcontractor, Laquila Construction, can begin excavating the east side of the tower site to prepare it for the underground infrastructure.

When he presided over the cornerstone-laying two years ago, Gov. George E. Pataki declared, "Today, we build the Freedom Tower."

As it turned out, the building could not start until the cornerstone was removed.

That i found while surfing the internet!Hope it is not posted yet!

http://www.pathrestoration.com/drp/images/gallery/wtcth/2006/05/Demo_HM01.jpg

The Church street side of the site.

does anyone know the type of construction will be used for freedom tower? will it have concrete core/steel frame? eg- Burj Dubai-all concrete,SWFC-concrete core, steel frame etc.
i have a feeling concrete core, steel flooring and frame.

The robust, redundant steel moment frame, consisting of beams and columns connected by a combination of welding and bolting, resists lateral loads through bending of the frame elements. Paired with a concrete-core shear wall, the moment frame lends substantial rigidity and redundancy to the overall building structure while providing column-free interior spans for maximum flexibility. Freedom Tower will be topping out in 2009 and is projected to be ready for occupancy in 2010.

^many thanks ebola.i sort of thought that would be case.
should look impressive while rising back up to 417m. and massive spire rising even further then original antenna.
cheers

Construction Workers To Rally At WTC Site Today

June 26, 2006

In an effort to get work on the Freedom Tower moving forward, construction workers and their supporters are set to rally at the World Trade Center site later today.

They're calling on six insurance companies to pay the $770 million in claims needed to get the project rolling.

The insurers say a tentative deal splitting ownership of buildings at the site between developer Larry Silverstein and the Port Authority may keep them from paying up.

They say since Silverstein would no longer own all the buildings, they may not be responsible for all the claims he was due.

The rally is set to kick off at noon at 1 Liberty Plaza.

This comes just days after we learned that construction at the World Trade Center site isn't just slow. It's actually going backwards. The Freedom Tower cornerstone was removed from the site Friday, two years after it was installed because of new design plans.

(http://www.ny1.com/ny1/content/index...id=1&aid=60521)


I found this over at SSP

Where is the big webcam?
I can`t find it anymore

http://images.earthcam.com/archives/gzmp/gzmp.jpg

the webcam is down. its been down for about 2 weeks.

Anyone seen CLICK in it he speeds up time 20 years and there are two freedom towers in the background, do they know something we dont.

Ground Zero Developer Sues WTC Insurers
by Arun Venugopal




NEW YORK, NY June 26, 2006 —Developer Larry Silverstein and the Port Authority went to court today to force World Trade Center insurers to make payments. They say seven companies are not promising to make good on claims, ever since Silverstein and the agency agreed to share in the rebuilding effort. WNYC's Arun Venugopal reports.

REPORTER: The insurers collectively owe 1.5 billion dollars in proceeds. According to Silverstein Properties, they have been playing down their obligations because Silverstein is no longer the leaseholder at some of the sites at Ground Zero. State Assemblyman Richard Brodsky helped conduct last month's hearings on redevelopment at Ground Zero. He says the lack of insurance proceeds could doom the Freedom Tower.

BRODSKY: It is on the cusp. There is a substantial likelihood...that the building won't be built.

REPORTER: Only one of the seven insurers responded to requests for comment. The Gulf Insurance company said it was reaching out to the parties involved and hoped to come to a resolution soon. For WNYC, I'm Arun Venugopal.

http://www.wnyc.org/news/articles/61616
I got this over from SSP

^BS.



THIS JUST IN:

The NEWEST version of Freedom Tower will be presented tomorrow!!!

I guess the public will get a view. I'm too excited to sleep. This version, by view, lacks the metal base and contains many other changes.

^oh my god this is getting silly

when ar they gonna call it quits and build the damn thing, the design gets considerably less inspired every redesign, i can imagine we'll be left with a tall glass cuboid with a cheap looking spire/antenna. Wouldnt worry too much though, it'll be redesigned again next year

^It is being built right now. That's why this thread is here.

^^ There is nothing being build at the moment. They are just clearing the site from rubbles. Atleast they have to start doing the perimeter hole, to call it starting of the construction. However redesigns can happen even after the tower is well above ground.

As for the tower to be build with metalic frame, is that the latest word or it is something before they redesigned it and moved the positioning further away from the street, adding platinium (bomb proof) protection plates at the bottom? Or that redesign and positioning called for a more robust concrete to be used instead, and that's how it will be build?

NEW YORK -- Designed to evoke the Statue of Liberty's torch, the spire that tops the 1,776-foot Freedom Tower will feature a revolving beacon that could change color and cast beams of light into the sky, while thousands of glass prisms will cover the building's 20-story, windowless base.

NEW YORK -- Designed to evoke the Statue of Liberty's torch, the spire that tops the 1,776-foot Freedom Tower will feature a revolving beacon that could change color and cast beams of light into the sky, while thousands of glass prisms will cover the building's 20-story, windowless base.
HOLY CRAP THAT SOUNDS AMAZING

so the base won't be a soulless fortress after all... great to hear! Glass prisms = awesome!

NY Sun
6/28/06

Freedom Tower Architect To Present Design Changes at Awards Ceremony Today

By DAVID LOMBINO, Staff Reporter of the Sun

Perhaps the third time will be the charm.

At an awards ceremony taking place 52 stories above the World Trade Center site, the architect of the Freedom Tower today will present recent design changes in front of more than 700 members of New York's architecture and design community. David Childs of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill could be trying to restore some enthusiasm for the centerpiece of ground zero.

The 1,776-foot-tall Freedom Tower has been termed the commercial "white elephant" of ground zero by critics who doubt that the building will be able to attract many private sector tenants, considering its potential as a terrorist target and its relative distance from public transportation. Following lengthy negotiations between the state, the city, the Port Authority, and developer Larry Silverstein, construction on the Freedom Tower began in earnest in late April.

Security requirements of the New York Police Department sent Mr. Childs and a team of architects back to the drawing board last spring to ensure the tower would be protected from truck bombs on nearby West Street.

The second round of designs, which included a 200-foot fortified steel base and a more conventionally shaped tower, received mixed reviews. One critic called the designs "somber, oppressive, and clumsily conceived." The architects wound up back at the drawing board again.

According to Mr. Childs's publicists, the architect today will "provide a much greater level of detail with regard to critical design elements, including the prismatic glass cladding for the tower's reinforced base, the antenna at the top," along with "the white glass curtain wall and the generous allotment of open spaces and landscaping for public use."

A fellow at the Fiscal Policy Institute, David Dyssegaard Kallick, said the seemingly endless series of redesigns creates uncertainty about the tower's future.

"Is it real or isn't it? There is some speculation about whether the next governor will want to go ahead with the plan as it is now configured," Mr. Kallick said.

Mr. Childs and Skidmore, Owings & Merrill will receive an award today from the New York Chapter of the American Institute of Architects for 7 World Trade Center, the only office building destroyed on September 11, 2001, that has been rebuilt. That building has received widespread critical acclaim.

In the last round of negotiations over development at ground zero, control over leasing the Freedom Tower was transferred to the Port Authority, which owns the 16-acre site of the former World Trade Center, from Silverstein Properties. The latter will still oversee the construction of the tower, expected to cost $1.7 billion.

Because of the Freedom Tower's symbolic value, Governor Pataki has been its biggest champion. He recently guaranteed that the state would persuade the federal government to occupy 1 million square feet of the Freedom Tower as a way to limit the risk to the Port Authority in taking control of the building.

The Port Authority chairman, Anthony Coscia, said this month that further changes to the Freedom Tower could be necessary if Mr. Pataki fails to secure the government tenants by late September. Port Authority officials have suggested that those changes could include lowering the height of the tower.

got this from Tonyo over at SSP.

And here she is:

http://img192.imageshack.us/img192/6431/28cndfreedom54505vg.jpg

^^ anybody else feel disappointed...again? i mean its great that the bottom has glass, but that roof...... :ohno:

^^ anybody else feel disappointed...again? i mean its great that the bottom has glass, but that roof...... :ohno:
it's at least a pretty good improvement over the last one...

just build it already

I am starting to change my mind. more from SSP

Architects Unveil New Design for Freedom Tower
By DAVID W. DUNLAP and GLENN COLLINS
Published: June 28, 2006

Eager to avoid creating a fortress that overshadows the World Trade Center memorial, the architects of the Freedom Tower unveiled a new approach today. They would clad its 187-foot-high, bomb-resistant concrete base in a screen of glass prisms rather than metal panels.

This and other notable refinements were described by the building's lead architect, David M. Childs of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill. He spoke at an awards ceremony held by the New York chapter of the American Institute of Architects in 7 World Trade Center, overlooking the Freedom Tower site, which is under excavation.

Even after the revisions, the building would still evoke the twin towers in its height and proportions. Its rooftop parapet would be 1,368 feet above the street, as was that of 1 World Trade Center, the north tower.

It turns out that in another important respect, the Freedom Tower would echo the twin towers: it would have a sky lobby. Tenants headed to the upper floors of the 102-story building would take express elevators to the 64th floor and then transfer to local elevators.

If all goes according to plan — almost nothing has at ground zero — completion of the $2 billion, 2.6 million-square-foot Freedom Tower is expected in 2011.

In the first redesign last year, the base was to rise 200 feet and perhaps be clad in stainless steel, aluminum or titanium. Though Mr. Childs envisioned these panels as enlivening the almost windowless facade, others despaired about its monolithic quality. The phrase "concrete bunker" was tossed around.

"There were a lot of concerns that this was going to look like a fortress," said Kenneth J. Ringler Jr., the executive director of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, for which Silverstein Properties is developing the Freedom Tower. "I think David's artistic skills should alleviate many of those fears."

Gov. George E. Pataki allowed that he had been worried himself.

"I shared the fears that the security issues would lead the base to be something more intimidating than inviting," he said, "but the building is light and very luminescent and very inviting, and at the same time meets the highest security standards in the world."

The timing of the unveiling, Mr. Childs said in an advance briefing, was prompted by the completion of what are known as design development drawings for the tower; far more refined and detailed than the schematic plans shown last year. "There is still work to do, but the official design phase is over," he said.

It does not hurt public-relations efforts by Larry A. Silverstein, the president and chief executive of Silverstein Properties, since it offers evidence that construction is proceeding, despite questions about whether his insurers will withhold more than $1.5 billion in payments and whether tenants can be found for the building.

The basic form of the building has not changed. It is an obelisk on which the corners are both tapered and chamfered, or cut away diagonally. The tip of its spire would still mark the symbolic pinnacle of 1,776 feet. It would be illuminated at night in an echo, however abstract, of the Statue of Liberty's torch.

And, barring new competitors, it would be the tallest building in the United States.

In the redesign last year, the tower was given a smaller floor area, or footprint, increasing its distance from West Street-Route 9A and any bomb-laden vehicle that might approach along that highway. With smaller floors, Mr. Childs said, it was no longer practical or desirable to have as many elevator shafts running the full height of the building, dictating a transfer floor, an unexceptional feature of high-rise buildings.

Although the idea summons memories of the 78th-floor sky lobby in 2 World Trade Center, where many people died on Sept. 11, 2001, as they waited for express elevators, Governor Pataki said he was not concerned about the reintroduction of a transfer floor.

There would be five service elevators that can reach every floor, including one water-resistant car, housed in a protected shaft, for use by firefighters and other rescue workers in an emergency. There would also be a dedicated, protected staircase for first responders, to avoid the jam of rescuers coming up while tenants are heading down.

The biggest changes have been made to the base; in essence, a security pedestal that is meant to lift the glass-clad office tower out of harm's way in the event of a bombing.

Though it looks fairly small in an overall view of the building, the base would dominate almost any view north from the World Trade Center memorial, across Fulton Street. From a pedestrian's perspective, it would be the face of the Freedom Tower.

The only occupied space within the base would be the lobby, with 50-foot ceilings. The rest of this lower structure would be used for mechanical equipment.

Mr. Childs now proposes to cover the base in panels of laminated glass with a saw-tooth face made of prisms in a vertical array. "You know this from high-school physics class," Mr. Childs said. "The sun hits the prism and breaks into color."

He said that full-scale mock-ups of this wall will be built in Kearney, N.J., to ensure that the fractured, reflected sunlight will not blind pedestrians or drivers.

Behind the glass would be concrete for the first 60 feet, then an open space known as a plenum, through which air is drawn to cool the equipment inside. At this point, there would be one- or two-foot spaces between the glass panels, backed by a protective aluminum screen.

Mr. Childs said that the base, made of high-density concrete (he would not specify the thickness of the walls, for security reasons), "does the job that the New York City police want it to do, in every respect."

A spokeswoman for Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg said that City Hall and the Police Department had been consulted and had raised no concerns. Their review of the project is continuing.

In case of an explosion, Mr. Childs said, the glass will crumble into little fragments because it is laminated, much like automobile safety glass or the panels on bus shelters.

Another noticeable change to the base is that its corners would be chamfered and tapered like the tower above. But the corners on the base would taper outward as they rise, creating four triangular spaces at ground level where small reflecting pools would go.

The main office entrance would be on Vesey Street. Visitors to the observation deck would enter from a triangular plaza off West Street and go down to the concourse level, where they would be screened. From there, they can make their ascent. Restaurant patrons would enter from a small plaza on the east side of the building.

Peter Walker & Partners are the landscape architects, as they are for the trade center memorial. Both the memorial and the area around the tower would be planted with sweetgum trees, known for their star-shaped leaves and brilliant autumnal color.

Daniel Libeskind, the official master planner of the trade center site, who tangled with Mr. Childs in 2003 over the first design of the Freedom Tower, said the latest refinements by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill were a tremendous improvement.

"They have brought luminosity and a prismatic quality to the base," he said, "and made the tower more crystalline."

The office tower, 1,182 feet in height, would be clad in 13-foot-high glass panels that cover not only the window openings but the horizontal spaces between them, called spandrels. That is meant to create a seamless, transparent expanse.

This long shaft has eight faces: elongated, interlocking isosceles triangles. The floor plan begins as a 200-by-200-foot square. As the corners taper, the plan turns into an octagon and then reverts to a square again, but one that is only 145-by-145 feet.

Because the base would be so tall, the first office floor atop the base is counted as Floor 20. There would be 69 office floors, ending at Floor 88. Above that would be broadcasting space on the 89th and 90th floors, followed by three mechanical floors so high they are counted as nine stories.

In the upper reaches, a restaurant would occupy the 100th and 101st floors. The enclosed observation deck, which would almost undoubtedly include a gift shop, would be at 102. Above that would be three floors of mechanical equipment.

The last 408 feet of the tower's height would be a structure, clad in fiberglass composite panels, with a gentle convex curve in the middle. Designed in collaboration with the sculptor Kenneth Snelson, it would hide a bristling forest of antennas.

More equipment would be hidden within a halo-like circular structure, 145 feet in diameter, close to the base of the spire. The entire ensemble will be illuminated, Mr. Childs said, with light-emitting diodes and floodlights.

As a champion of the idea that the Freedom Tower should pay architectural homage to the Statue of Liberty, Mr. Libeskind offered one criticism. "I think they should work to make the figure of the torch more apparent," he said. "Even if you illuminate the flame, it is very abstract right now."

"With further refinement," he said of the latest Freedom Tower redesign, "it can become an icon for the city. But that will depend on how the top of the building looks."





http://graphics10.nytimes.com/images/2006/06/28/nyregion/28cnd-freedom.4.450.jpg
http://graphics10.nytimes.com/images/2006/06/28/nyregion/28cnd-freedom.7.650.jpg

^^ anybody else feel disappointed...again? i mean its great that the bottom has glass, but that roof...... :ohno:


Are you kidding me? I love this version the most.

^^ anybody else feel disappointed...again? i mean its great that the bottom has glass, but that roof...... :ohno:
Yeah, it's like finding out that the tower has been circumcised.

Wait -- so Freedom Tower has over 100 floors now?

Larger renderings from SSP:

http://www.renewnyc.com/images_WMS/freedom_tower/Section_06-27-06.jpg

http://www.renewnyc.com/images_WMS/freedom_tower/ModelSouthElevation_06-27.jpg

http://www.renewnyc.com/images_WMS/freedom_tower/WestPlaza_06-27-06.jpg

That roof thing looks strange but im liking the redesign overall.

Is the updated design now really the final design or it is possible that they will change the design again?

^^ It is possible. The design can change because it's only the antenna section.

Which means that construction of the tower is not affected whatsoever.

So the towers deign (except the antenna) is finished?And have I understand it right that the tower will now have 100 floors?

It's more than 100 floors because I've read that an observation deck will be on the 102nd floor.

Oh great!Is after the design changings now a open Ob deck planned?The plaza west looks very great!!!!!!!!!!

I think it looks woeful.

The glass base is better bust still pretty drab. The whole street level integration is just third rate.

The top is ghastly with the George Jetson 70's ring and misplaced mast that looks like it doesn't belong there, a first year designer could tell you it doesn't match the building form beneath it.

The actual tower is generic and looks like some cheap SWFC knock off. Where is the creativity? where is the innovation? where is the inspiration?

All in all a lesson in mediocrity. That's arrogant Childs for you.

Oh well, can't say it was unexpected. Let a hack design it and you get hack results.

So are they counting the spire as part of the total height or not? If it is, I will feel disappointed because it is like they cheated to get up to 1776ft when it is really much shorter.

^^ The spire is counted because the roof height will be exactly the same as WTC 1.

Come on someone else had to see CLICK and yell out holy shit and then have everyone look at you, and ya, it cheats big time too with a 400ft spire NYC has been getting their height lightly by adding spires, it's still tacked on to not incorporated like ESB or Crysler. Fordman Spire still beats this one oh and so does Sears, anyone notice the new China builds have a flat roof thats awsome im starting to like China more.

^^ The Twin Towers were the best design.

It's the so-called "families of the victims" (they are not actual victims themselves) that are crying to prevent the twin towers from returning.

I like the new tower (not spire) i just want 2 of the new towers.

Does anyone know exactly how many stories she'll have? I think it's 105.

http://66.230.220.70/images/post/wtc/115.jpg
it doesn't look that bad but that ring around the roof is way too big!

I like the "ring". it looks like a crown.

What was that? You don't like Freedom Tower?

http://img519.imageshack.us/img519/2828/copyof28cndfreedom54509zg.jpg

whats wrong with you guys? lol
this is a brilliant tower. such a deserving monument built to replace the WTC.
love it.
btw, im going to add to my monthly diagrams and include it in big 3 diagram , now BIG 4.

http://img431.imageshack.us/img431/7407/modelsouthelevation06275xr.jpg

btw, im going to add to my monthly diagrams and include it in big 3 diagram , now BIG 4 thats cool, but it will be a long time before you will see any steel rise.

^ Maybe they'll start in a few weeks, maybe months, but steel will be up before the year's end.

Lets be thankful this never happened!

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v251/SJM87/freedom20tower.jpg

Its a nice looking tower... I guess but it doesn't really have a unique design that will set it apart from other skyscrapers. I guess that's okay as the Twin Towers weren't exactly unique either.

the doughnut on the top looks shit

I liked the initial design better.

Can somebody post pictures of the several redesigns of the freedom tower?

Redesigns:

1. First we had the Freedom tower of the original design of Daniel Liebeskind.
http://www.buildings.com/images/WTC/Studio/StudioDanielLibeskindWTCDe/images/viewweststreet.jpg

2. Then we got the hightened towers of the design of Daniel Liebeskind.

3. Then we got the design which added more towers, and a new Freedom Tower.
http://www.nynewsday.com/media/photo/2004-09/14194326.jpg

4. Then again, the surrendering towers of the FT where hightened to add more floor space.
http://www.mediabistro.com/fishbowlny/original/freedomtower.jpg

5. Then, a all new design for the Freedom Tower is proposed.
http://www.techno-science.net/illustration/Architecture/Gratte-ciel/Img/Freedom-Tower-3.jpg

6. Some changes had been made on the freedom tower. (06-28-06)


In progress:
Design changes on the surrendering towers of the FT. They will be finished by late summer '06.

In my opinion, I absolutely love the freedom tower. I never really had a problem with the first designs that had the lattice work. I dont understand it, first everyone wants to build the original towers again, then we get the latticework design and everyone hated it. The design was very origional and really did stand out. But when we get a tower that is owe so similar to the origionals people still have something to say about is not being origional enough!!! The twin towers were twice as bland as this design!! They were just two huge boxes that people didnt really mention until they were gone!! Cant we all just be greatful for what we have? Its a beatiful design, that has the potential to be an icon!! Look at the bright side of things, lets be glad they are finally building something there. Its been a long time coming!!!

anyone think the top part would look better like the top of US bank in LA?

http://www.geocities.com/los_angeles_coast/LibraryTower.jpg

not the exact same shape, just same design in the ring.

does anyone have pictures of the proposal made by zaha hadid?

thank god those towers around the freedom tower really are going to be redesigned...they dont match or go with the design of the FT.

.....they are being redesigned. read more.

posted on SSP by tonyo

AM New York
June 29, 2006

Freedom Tower gets government tenants

The Associated Press

Gov. George Pataki Thursday announced that the General Services Administration, which manages federal office space, signed a letter of intent to occupy 600,000 square feet in the Freedom Tower. One of the tenants would be the U.S. Customs House, a former tenant at the trade center before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

The chairman of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which owns the site and is developing the Freedom Tower, had indicated the tower's design could be changed if government leases don't come through. But Childs said Wednesday that these latest drawings are final.

David Childs, the architect of the 1,776-foot structure, unveiled the new design details Wednesday at an American Institute of Architects ceremony inside 7 World Trade Center, the skyscraper Childs also designed that sits across from ground zero.

Glass prisms, landscaped plazas and a lighted spire meant to resemble the Statue of Liberty's torch are all part of the latest design of the skyscraper being built to replace the World Trade Center.

Construction began this spring on the Freedom Tower, after a redesign more than a year ago to address concerns it wasn't adequately protected from truck bombs. The building was moved several feet back from the street and made smaller, with a footprint the identical size of one of the twin towers.

So far, the building, which has a 2011 projected opening date, had failed to attract tenants. But the government earlier this year promised to fill 1 million square feet of the 2.6 million square foot office building with federal and state office space.

The new glass design tries to address criticism that the windowless, 20-story concrete base resembled more of a bunker than office building. Architects had originally thought that shimmering metal panels would cover the bottom of the building, but recently decided on 13-foot-high panels that combine triangular glass prisms.

The prisms would create a "wonderful, light, sculptural and I think artistic" effect and make the building appear more open, said Childs.

The glass panels are still being developed.

"Three glass manufacturers around the world are working on this," said Jeffrey Holmes, a senior designer with Childs' Skidmore, Owings & Merrill firm.

Security experts have approved of the new panels, which are designed to shatter into tiny particles so they won't cause severe damage, designers said.

Childs said the spire, enclosed in a white, fiberglass sheath that a sculptor is helping to create, would make it more visible from a distance and a landmark similar to the spires on the Empire State Building and the Chrysler Building.

Daniel Libeskind, the original architect of the Freedom Tower, initially designed the spire to be off-center on a twisting building meant to resemble the Statue of Liberty. The spire was since moved to the center of the building and remains there, but the new design calls for a pedestal, housing satellite dishes and antennas, that more closely resembles the statue's torch.

The tree-lined plazas, developed by the landscape architect for the trade center memorial, would be on all four sides of the building; one entrance would take an estimated 5 million annual visitors to an observation deck, while another would go straight to restaurant space on the higher floors. Visitors could also enter from an underground concourse that connects to more than a dozen train lines.

With a 50-foot-high lobby and 69 floors of office space, the Freedom Tower is scheduled to open in 2011.

Associated Press writer Verena Dobnik contributed to this report.

thank god those towers around the freedom tower really are going to be redesigned...they dont match or go with the design of the FT.

those are placeholder designs really, they never had any real detail even in Liebeskind design.

Sorry i couldnt resist!!!
http://img444.imageshack.us/img444/1427/lol9gz.jpg

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/29/nyregion/29freedom.html
Freedom Tower Sheds the Look of Bulky Armor

By DAVID W. DUNLAP and GLENN COLLINS
Published: June 29, 2006

http://graphics10.nytimes.com/images/2006/06/29/nyregion/29freedom1.600.jpg
Erik Jacobs/The New York Times

The Freedom Tower's lead architect, David M. Childs, Wednesday behind a model of the New York skyline, with the proposed Freedom Tower on the right. He spoke about several notable changes to the tower's design.

http://graphics10.nytimes.com/images/2006/06/29/nyregion/29freedom2.190.jpg
Skidmore, Owings & Merrill

A rendering of the tower's revised design, which calls for its bomb-resistant concrete base to be screened by glass prisms rather than metal panels.

Eager to avoid creating a fortress that overshadows the World Trade Center memorial, the architects of the Freedom Tower unveiled a new approach yesterday. They would clad its 187-foot-high, bomb-resistant concrete base in a screen of glass prisms rather than metal panels.

This and other notable refinements were described by the building's lead architect, David M. Childs of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill. He spoke at an awards ceremony held by the New York chapter of the American Institute of Architects in 7 World Trade Center, overlooking the Freedom Tower site, which is under excavation.

Even after the revisions, the building would still evoke the twin towers in its height and proportions. Its rooftop parapet would be 1,368 feet above the street, as was that of 1 World Trade Center, the north tower.

It turns out that in another important respect, the Freedom Tower would echo the twin towers: it would have a sky lobby. Tenants headed to the upper floors of the 102-story building would take express elevators to the 64th floor and then transfer to local elevators.

If all goes according to plan — and almost nothing has at ground zero — the $2 billion, 2.6-million-square-foot Freedom Tower would be completed in 2011.

In the first redesign last year, the base of the tower was to rise 200 feet and perhaps be clad in stainless steel, aluminum or titanium. Though Mr. Childs envisioned these panels as enlivening the almost windowless facade, others despaired about its monolithic quality. The phrase "concrete bunker" was tossed around.

"There were a lot of concerns that this was going to look like a fortress," said Kenneth J. Ringler Jr., the executive director of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, for which Silverstein Properties is developing the Freedom Tower. "I think David's artistic skills should alleviate many of those fears."

Gov. George E. Pataki allowed that he had been worried himself.

"I shared the fears that the security issues would lead the base to be something more intimidating than inviting," he said, "but the building is light and very luminescent and very inviting, and at the same time meets the highest security standards in the world."

The design drew mixed reactions at yesterday's presentation. "The best part is the change in materials at the base — it glistens and sparkles now," said Fredric M. Bell, executive director of the architects' association chapter.

But while also praising that feature, another architect, Bruce S. Fowle, a principal of FXFowle Architects, remarked that the tower "seems a little uninspired for a building of this magnitude."

The timing of the unveiling, Mr. Childs said in an advance briefing, was prompted by the completion of what are known as the tower's design development drawings, which are far more refined and detailed than the schematic plans shown last year. "There is still work to do, but the official design phase is over," he said.

It does not hurt public relations efforts by Larry A. Silverstein, the president and chief executive of Silverstein Properties, since it offers evidence that construction is proceeding, despite questions about whether his insurers will withhold more than $1.5 billion in payments and whether tenants can be found for the building.

The basic form of the building has not changed. It is an obelisk on which the corners are both tapered and chamfered, or cut away diagonally. The tip of its spire would still mark the symbolic pinnacle of 1,776 feet. It would be illuminated at night in an echo, however abstract, of the Statue of Liberty's torch.

And, barring new competitors, it would be the tallest building in the United States.

In the redesign last year, the tower was given a smaller floor area, or footprint, increasing its distance from West Street-Route 9A and any bomb-laden vehicle that might approach along that highway. With smaller floors, Mr. Childs said, it was no longer practical or desirable to have as many elevator shafts running the full height of the building, dictating a transfer floor, an unexceptional feature of high-rise buildings.

Although the idea summons memories of the 78th-floor sky lobby in 2 World Trade Center, where many people died on Sept. 11 as they waited for express elevators, Governor Pataki said he was not concerned about the reintroduction of a transfer floor.

"Sky lobbies are almost inevitable in these tall skyscrapers," said Glenn P. Corbett, an assistant professor of fire science at John Jay College of Criminal Justice. "But they should invite an independent panel of experts to assess the building's safety."

There would be five service elevators that can reach every floor, including one water-resistant car, housed in a protected shaft, for use by firefighters and other rescue workers in an emergency. The biggest changes have been made to the base; in essence, a security pedestal that is meant to lift the glass-clad office tower out of harm's way in the event of a bombing.

Though it looks fairly small in an overall view of the building, the base would dominate almost any view north from the World Trade Center memorial, across Fulton Street. The only occupied space within the base would be the lobby, with 50-foot ceilings. The rest of this lower structure would be used for mechanical equipment.

Mr. Childs now proposes to cover the base in panels of laminated glass with a saw-tooth face made of prisms in a vertical array. "You know this from high school physics class," Mr. Childs said. "The sun hits the prism and breaks into color."

He said that full-scale mock-ups of this wall would be built in Kearny, N.J., to ensure that the fractured, reflected sunlight will not blind pedestrians or drivers.

Mr. Childs said that the base, made of high-density concrete (he would not specify the thickness of the walls, for security reasons), "does the job that the New York City police want it to do, in every respect."

A spokeswoman for Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg said that City Hall and the Police Department had been consulted and had raised no concerns. Their review of the project is continuing.

In case of an explosion, Mr. Childs said, the glass will crumble into little fragments, much like automobile safety glass.

Another noticeable change to the base is that its corners would be chamfered and tapered. The main office entrance would be on Fulton Street. Visitors to the observation deck would enter from a triangular plaza off West Street and go down to the concourse level, where they would be screened. From there, they would make their ascent. Restaurant patrons would enter from a small plaza on the east side of the building.

Peter Walker & Partners are the landscape architects, as they are for the trade center memorial.

Daniel Libeskind, the official master planner of the trade center site, who tangled with Mr. Childs in 2003 over the first design of the Freedom Tower, said the latest refinements by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill were a tremendous improvement.

"They have brought luminosity and a prismatic quality to the base," he said, "and made the tower more crystalline."

The office tower, 1,182 feet in height, would be clad in 13-foot-high glass panels that cover not only the window openings but the horizontal spaces between them, called spandrels. That is meant to create a seamless, transparent expanse.

Because the base would be so tall, the first office floor atop the base is counted as Floor 20. There would be 69 office floors, ending at Floor 88. Above that would be broadcasting space on the 89th and 90th floors, followed by three mechanical floors so high they are counted as nine stories.

In the upper reaches, a restaurant would occupy the 100th and 101st floors. The enclosed observation deck, which would almost undoubtedly include a gift shop, would be at 102. Above that would be three floors of mechanical equipment.

The last 408 feet of the tower's height would be a white structure, clad in fiberglass composite panels, with a gentle convex curve in the middle. Designed in collaboration with the sculptor Kenneth Snelson, it would hide a bristling forest of antennas.

More equipment would be hidden within a halo-like circular structure, 145 feet in diameter, close to the base of the spire. The entire ensemble will be illuminated with light-emitting diodes and floodlights.

"With further refinement," Mr. Libeskind said of the Freedom Tower redesign, "it can become an icon for the city. But that will depend on how the top of the building looks."

it's good, but not great.

I prefered the latticework towers personally.

does anyone have pictures of the proposal made by zaha hadid?
http://www.aia.org/aiarchitect/thisweek04/tw1008/1008book_6asymptote.jpg
http://www.thecityreview.com/nymdes1.gif

^^ Thats pretty aweful really.

http://www.aia.org/aiarchitect/thisweek04/tw1008/1008book_6asymptote.jpg
http://www.thecityreview.com/nymdes1.gif
Are you sure they're the same, one looks way thinner than the other.

2011? Whats going on, in the old days it would have been finished 2 years ago.

http://www.nypost.com/postopinion/editorial/towering_questions_editorial_.htm
TOWERING QUESTIONS

June 30, 2006 -- Designers of the Freedom Tower - that theoretical construct meant to replace the World Trade Center - are at it again, out with more revisions to the promised skyscraper.

This time, the reception seems several degrees above icy: "A Soaring Triumph," read the headline on a column by The Post's Steve Cuozzo, who had bitterly criticized earlier incarnations.

"Another Change for the Better," a New York Sun headline read.

Of course, The New York Times, reflexively hostile to any development that might conflict with its corporate real-estate interests, cited "mixed" reaction: The revision seems "a little uninspired for a building of this magnitude," the paper quoted architect Bruce Fowle as saying.

But that's to be expected.

From our view, the changes seem fine.

They reduce some bulkiness at the base, add glass features that hold great potential for a grand light show and include attractive features like a sky lobby.

Still, the question we've been asking all along remains:

Can the thing really be built?

Earlier this week, the developers - Larry Silverstein, who holds the WTC lease, and the Port Authority, which owns the site - went to court to force the Twin Towers' insurers to pay what they owe: about $2.2 billion, of $4.6 billion in total.

And there, in court, is where the Freedom Tower (and the rest of the Ground Zero project) will likely stay - and for who-knows-how-long.

The insurers, you see, don't want - and, indeed, aren't legally allowed - to pay any more than is stipulated in the relevant policies they wrote.

And they think those policies may dictate a lower payout under the latest rebuilding scheme. So they're balking.

Who can blame them?

Gov. Pataki, who has (in a manner of speaking) led the rebuilding project, failed to get the insurers' blessing when he, Silverstein, the Port Authority and Mayor Bloomberg cobbled together a rebuilding plan back in April.

It was yet another jerry-rigged scheme in a long line of false starts (failure to address security concerns, for example, delayed the tower by a year), and it's not at all clear whether it'll work.

And, as we've noted, other problems abound. Yesterday, Pataki announced a deal for the U.S. Customs and Border Protection Bureau to lease some 600,000 square feet of the 2.6 million square-foot tower. But the building still lacks leases from other tenants (public agencies, presumably) that Pataki promised would take space. And even the April deal itself has yet actually to be signed.

All this, as a new governor - with possibly new ideas for Ground Zero - gets set to replace Pataki in just six months.

So, yes, the new design may be lovely - "soaring," even. But will the Freedom Tower - and the rest of Ground Zero - ever move beyond just a "design"?

We certainly hope so.

But will hope be enough?

http://archrecord.construction.com/news/wtc/archives/060629childs.asp

Childs Unveils Final Design for Freedom Tower

June 29, 2006

The yearlong design development of the World Trade Center Freedom Tower concludes Friday. To mark the occasion, on Wednesday David Childs, FAIA, of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, presented several final drawings and maquettes to an audience of 700 architects, engineers, and clients at the AIA New York Chapter’s 2006 Design Awards.

“The building is remarkably the same as the one I unveiled a year ago,” Childs said, but he stressed three significant design refinements since then. The building’s antenna, for example, will be constructed as a closed form; Childs and collaborator Kenneth Snelson originally proposed an open latticework. This final iteration features a lozenge shape that tapers to a point, and the web-like frame is slightly visible underneath it. Childs said the iconographic element will still have the quality of lightness, and suggested that it would be programmed with light displays and other dynamic features.

In addition, the glazing surrounding the building’s 69 office floors will eliminate spandrels. Each glass component will stretch to the floor’s full, 13-foot, 4-inch height. This characteristic offers “a unique character of monumentality,” Childs said. “It also provides a marker in the sky of the most important place, the memorial itself.”

In introducing changes made to the base of the Freedom Tower, Childs confided that he “wasn’t sure” of the architecture’s ultimate evolution. Safety concerns forced the design team to wrap the bottom 186-foot-tall portion in a wall of concrete that is almost uniformly three feet thick. “The concrete could have looked like a barracks,” he said. The solution: 2,000 sheets of prismatic, laminated safety glass will clad the concrete. The 4-by13-foot panels features prisms of different depths; the variety is meant to animate the skin with a variety of shadows and colors that move according to weather conditions, or with the changing perspective of the viewer. “Most consistent with the building would be to build the space out of glass,” Childs noted. “This is a friendly, warm plinth to the shaft above it.”

The multifaceted skin will fold and morph into seating at the plaza level. Childs, who envisioned “confusion about whether the building is growing out of the ground,” is working with Peter Walker, who is also the memorial’s landscape architect, on this aspect of the project.

World Trade Center developer Larry Silverstein introduced Childs at the event. He promised listeners that the Freedom Tower—for which below-grade excavations, footings, and foundations were begun in April—would be ready for occupancy by 2011, and the entire site completed the following year.

David Sokol

http://archrecord.construction.com/news/images/060629childs1lg.jpg
http://archrecord.construction.com/news/images/060629childs2lg.jpg
http://archrecord.construction.com/news/images/060629childs3lg.jpg
Images courtesy Silverstein Properties, Inc., and Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP

This skyscraper will look very great.!!!

Was the question perhaps already required, but the tower will have a concrete core or a steel core?

A concrete core with 2 -3 feet thick walls.

Whats that little building next to Freedom Tower and infront of 7WTC?

http://archrecord.construction.com/news/images/060629childs1lg.jpg

Its the performing arts center.

I have to say, the whole new WTC project now just seems bland to me, every redesign has brought it closer to the look of the Old Twin Towers (which I thought were ugly), Freedom Tower has become grey and boxy. A real disappointment for me.

I have to say, the whole new WTC project now just seems bland to me, every redesign has brought it closer to the look of the Old Twin Towers (which I thought were ugly), Freedom Tower has become grey and boxy. A real disappointment for me.
I think that's what a lot of people wanted if they couldn't get the twin towers rebuilt - a tower that evokes the image of the old towers. This is kind of a compromise between the people who wanted the old towers rebuilt and the people who favored a new design.

the spire looks ugly ... i think they isnt compatible with the building ... looks like a turned pin ...

Freedom Tower has become grey and boxy its not grey, its silver, and the base changes color when UV rays hit it.