May 20, 2006  

Ground Zero bickering stops for a moment to Think Different

The International Freedom Center, a cultural hub designed to commemorate 9/11 by promoting America’s most important value at the site of its worst foreign attack, was shelved last year when the governor got cold feet because victims’ families wanted the entirety of Ground Zero turned into a somber memorial to the dead.

911Memorials.org, a grass-roots watchdog site that helped expel the Freedom Center, has been tracking developments at Ground Zero. Today they asked “Can a glass box save Ground Zero?” (a reference to the new Apple Store design on 5th Ave).

Well, in any event Apple opened a nifty store at GM [General Motors]. LMDC in creating the below level plaza design cited the GM building plaza. That plaza was a dreay failure. Amazing what a glass box did for improving it. A glass box would sure address a lot of problems they have now.

Um, hello? Was no one awake last year? Snøhetta’s design for the Freedom Center — now the design for the ambiguous Cultural Center and possibly for the Memorial museum itself — is exactly that. The majority of 9/11 artifacts was to be housed underground with at least one above-ground entry via the glass box that was the cultural center. How is it that the Apple design is now a unique inspiration? And isn’t Snøhetta still contracted for some construction at Ground Zero? I’d like to know what problems the glass box/mostly underground design will solve this year that it would not have solved last year?

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