Update: Freedom Tower

Sweet. Hopefully it remains safe. I can't wait to see it completed.

 

Don't see what it has to do with "freedom."

 

It's One World Trade Center (1WTC), not Freedom Tower. It's truly a beautiful piece of architecture.

It's now the tallest building in lower Manhatten:

 

Rising up out of the ashes like a giant middle finger.

 

Also a giant use of public funds to provide HUGE amounts of extra office space in an area that has high vacancy rates, low rents, and doesn't need it, meanwhile other local infrastructure projects suffer and the PANYNJ keeps jacking up tolls & transit fares....

I like lower manhattan and am all for it's development, but its development isn't really served by a lot more office space than it could ever need.

 

I think when they were building this they weren't really worried about the economy.

I'd imagine its more of a statement to the world in that knock America down and we'll get back up.

 

Yep totally agree -- this building can go way over budget and so long as it is bad ass when completed i'm 100% supporting it -- an epic F U to those that want to bring us down.

 

Get back up more than 10 years later? A day late and a dollar short in my opinion.

 

So... maybe they rent parts of a floor for, say, an Islamic community center?

 

I get it, but at some point (especially if you're the ones paying for it) when you're dealing with limited PA-NY/NJ dollars....prudence has to take priorit over pride.

It's sort of like what would happen if terrorists blew up the Astrodome. I mean we all loved the Astrodome as kids, but would you really want them to build a replacement Astrodome right there next to Reliant out of spite? Or would you look to a more sensible use of urban land & public funds?

I think the real "F-U" was a seal raid in Abottabad a few months ago.

 

In a way, this is the perfect monument for 9/11. Bin Laden is dead, Al Qaeda got no where close to achieving their goal of inciting an religious revolution or any interest in a "caliphate," the one thing it did succeed at is making Americans waste a lot of money (and lives) in useless stuff from the TSA to the Iraq war.

A hugely expensive empty building wonderfully reflects this.

 

I think a lot of people would actually love to see the Astrodome go, amd that's a bad comparison...one is empty, and the other had thousands of people in it get killed.

 

It's not empty, there is a major magazine publisher moving in there at what is effectively publicly subsidized, rock-bottom rent; 1WTC stands forth, striding into the print media future!

It's actually a great comparison because it underscores that the thing is being put up based on emotion not on need.

 

It will stand at 1776 feet high with the spire. A little cheesy, but totally subtle.

 

Just to kick us in the balls, wouldn't it make sense for terrorists to target this new structure?

 

Shipping container Subway restaurant at the Freedom Tower.
They really are everywhere..

 

let's hope that this one's super-thermite resistant

 

Knock down 2 skyscrapers

We build 4 in their place.

 

Dumb question; why didn't they just rebuild the exact same buildings?

Seems to me that would've been both practical and symbolic as anything.