By: Karen Matthews
Associated Press
NEW YORK - Two plans featuring structures that
would rise taller than any other in the world have
been picked as finalists in the selection of a design
to rebuild the World Trade Center, a source familiar
with the plans said Tuesday.
One proposal evokes the original trade center with
twin latticework towers, while the other preserves
the foundations of the twin towers, according to
the source, who spoke to The Associated Press
on condition of anonymity.
A final choice is to be made later this month by the
Lower Manhattan Development Corp. and the
Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, the
agency that owned the World Trade Center.
The formal announcement of the finalists was to
be announced publicly Tuesday afternoon.
Both finalist designs - by an architectural team
known as THINK and by Berlin-based architect
Daniel Libeskind - feature structures rising higher
than the tallest in the world, Malaysia's 1,483-foot
Petronas Twin Towers.
The World Trade Center's twin towers
measured 1,350 feet.
The THINK team, led by New York-based architects
Rafael Vinoly and Frederic Schwartz, proposed the
World Cultural Center, whose lacy 1,665-foot towers
have been called 21st-century Eiffel Towers.
Libeskind, who designed Berlin's Jewish Museum,
proposed starkly geometrical buildings clustered
around the foundations of the fallen towers and
topped by a 1,776-foot spire.
Although both finalists include soaring structures,
neither plan conceives of office space extending
all the way to the top.
The models each include a vision for where the
victims' memorial might be built. A specific design
for the memorial is expected to be chosen later
this year in a separate competition. Nearly 2,800
people were killed in the attack on the trade center
Sept. 11, 2001.
Spokesmen for the two finalists did not immediately
return calls seeking comment.
The two finalists were among nine proposals for
redeveloping the 16-acre World Trade Center
site that were unveiled Dec. 18. The plans were
selected from 407 submissions from around the world.
One of the nine semifinalist designs was later withdrawn.
An earlier group of proposed designs, released in
July, was criticized as boring and overstuffed with
office space.
While no one expects an exact replica of either of
the finalists to rise at the site, officials at the development
corporation have said whatever is built there will be
based on one of the plans.
Recurring turf battles over control of the site may
complicate the decision-making, though.
Developer Larry Silverstein, who holds the lease to the
trade center site, complained in a letter to development
corporation chairman John Whitehead last week that
the proposed designs do not include enough office space.
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