Date: Wed, 13 Aug 2003 00:07:08 -0400 (EDT) From: Louis Epstein Subject: WTC Rebuilding #243:Deutsche Bank Dem,olition Suit,NYCS Back Up The NYCS board got back in action yesterday. It's the lead "Message Boards" link at http://www.put.com/wtc/ if you haven't been there. Over the weekend an issue has emerged that has potential to frustrate the official planners...two of the main insurers of the damaged Deutsche Bank (built as Bankers Trust) building across Liberty Street from the WTC site are refusing to pay it off as a total loss and see it demolished,as Pataki's people are planning on...they want to pay for repairs,which would cost them half as much. The article below sets out the early situation... the suit mentioned as threatened has since been filed, as Deutsche wants a total loss payout.(They have moved their Downtown headquarters to 60 Wall Street,which they bought from JP Morgan Chase). ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Sat, 9 Aug 2003 09:07:44 -0400 (EDT) Subject: NYTimes.com Article: Insurers Block Plans to Raze Deutsche Bank \----------------------------------------------------------/ Insurers Block Plans to Raze Deutsche Bank August 9, 2003 By MICHAEL SLACKMAN Plans to tear down the Deutsche Bank building at the foot of the World Trade Center site are being blocked by two insurance companies arguing that the 40-story skyscraper can be repaired and reoccupied, a position that threatens to complicate the redevelopment of ground zero. Those involved in the design and development of the site have for weeks operated under the assumption that the bank building, at 130 Liberty Street, would be torn down and the land it stands on incorporated into the ambitious construction project. But now, the fate of the building is uncertain, and its owner, Deutsche Bank, is promising to go to court on Monday if the insurers do not agree by tomorrow to declare it a total loss and let it be torn down. The bank has taken tens of thousands of samples from the building and told insurers that it is too contaminated to reoccupy. "At this point we are moving forward with a plan that incorporates 130 Liberty into the redevelopment plan," said a senior official involved in the rebuilding effort. "That does not in any way anticipate that the building will still be there. It anticipates the building will be taken down." For the moment, at least one of the insurers, Allianz, is holding firm, insisting that the total loss to Deutsche Bank should be about $500 million, less than half of the $1.05 billion the owner has claimed. Allianz is responsible for 30 percent of any claim and the second insurer, AXA, of Paris, would have to cover 20 percent. Two other insurers who have agreed to settle with the bank would pay the other 50 percent. "The conclusion is, like the surrounding buildings, this can be cleaned and repaired," said Sabia Schwarzer, an Allianz spokeswoman based in Silver Spring, Md., who confirmed that her company received Deutsche Bank's ultimatum in a letter at its headquarters in Germany earlier this week. An AXA spokesman in Paris said the company would not comment on matters involving its clients. Unless Allianz's position is a negotiating tactic, it could complicate the construction of a memorial and business complex on and around the World Trade Center site. At the very least, a lawsuit could delay dealing with a building that some community and public officials have said is a symbol of decay and inaction in Lower Manhattan. The fate of the Deutsche Bank building has also been framed as a question of aesthetics. By removing the 1970's-era steel-and-glass skyscraper that soars 560 feet into the air, developers and designers would be able to better integrate the new project into the community, said Fredric Bell, executive director of the New York chapter of the American Institute of Architects. "What happens around the perimeter of the 16-acre site is as significant as what happens on the site itself," Mr. Bell said. "In creating a neighborhood, there needs to be a degree of continuity. That building is a symbol of the past and not the future." On Sept. 11, 2001, the building, which stood just 600 feet from 2 World Trade Center, was blasted with debris. More than 1,700 windows were shattered, and a piece of the collapsing trade center tower smashed into the building's north face, tearing a gash, breaking through concrete and twisting beams across 15 floors. But Deutsche Bank has said that the main reason the building could not be reoccupied was because of contamination from dust spiked with asbestos and other contaminants. It wrote in its claim that the building was subject to tornado-force winds, earthquake-like shaking and pressure waves that forced dust into "every crack and crevice" in the building. "The building was the most affected of major office buildings outside of the W.T.C. site itself," Deutsche Bank wrote. How to redevelop Lower Manhattan has been a sensitive issue from the very start, complicated by efforts to balance business interests with emotional and aesthetic concerns. Recently, after months of arguing, officials overseeing the project resolved major areas of dispute, paving the way for Daniel Libeskind's winning design to be built in substantially recognizable form. But several of those resolutions were predicated on the availability of the land beneath the Deutsche Bank building. Though Deutsche Bank has not said what it would do with its parcel if the building is torn down, it has indicated that it would be willing to sell it, which could provide a contiguous piece of land suitable for office space. Engineers for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey have also been looking at moving a security screening area used by trucks making deliveries to a site beneath what is now the Deutsche Bank building. But the building would have to come down first. "It is a safety valve, in that it does relieve the pressure of having too dense a development on the site," Mr. Bell said. "It is a way of releasing that pressure, and it could work in the context of redeveloping Lower Manhattan." If the issue with the insurers is not resolved, public officials could still move to condemn the property, pay Deutsche Bank what was determined to be the parcel's market value, and file its own lawsuit against the insurers seeking to compel them to pay, said the senior official involved in the rebuilding. Deutsche Bank has four insurers for the building, with a total possible benefit of $1.7 billion. Two insurers have already agreed to Deutsche Bank's $1.05 billion estimate of loss - the Chubb Corporation, which would be responsible for covering 30 percent, and Zurich Financial, which would cover 20 percent. Allianz and AXA said that they estimated the total loss as about $500 million, according to people affiliated with the insurers, and they have asked Deutsche Bank to turn over proof of its loss by Monday. Deutsche Bank declined to elaborate, saying that negotiations were ongoing. However this is resolved, the building will either have to be taken down or repaired. Either could prove difficult and costly, said Howard P. Zweig, a structural engineer who was part of the building's original design team. Mr. Zweig, who is managing partner with The Office of James Ruderman engineering firm, said he had not been involved in the inspection of the building after Sept. 11, but from a structural perspective, it appeared that the building could probably be repaired. That was the same conclusion reached by the Federal Emergency Management Agency in a study published in May 2002. However, Mr. Zweig and others said potential contamination could prove a problem, not only for reoccupation but also for taking the building down. Neighbors of the building, who fled after the disaster and have in many cases only recently returned home, are of mixed minds about taking it down. Some want to see it leveled, while others are concerned about the noise and danger associated with the demolition. "There are concerns over the environmental impact," said Paul Goldstein, district manager of Community Board 1, which represents Lower Manhattan. "But there is a lot of interest in taking it down. It's just another sign of Sept. 11." http://www.nytimes.com/2003/08/09/nyregion/09DEUT.html?ex=1061434464&ei=1&en=e7441b8db03e0acd Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company ---------- End forwarded message ---------- Obviously,our interests lie with whatever ensures that the new office space is built on,not off,the 16 acres,as this encourages its being squeezed into taller buildings. And anything that derails the stampede timetable will help keep the door open to better plans. http://www.nypost.com/news/regionalnews/38763.htm and http://www.nypost.com/news/regionalnews/3057.htm are NY Post stories on this Deutsche insurance issue. http://www.nydailynews.com/news/local/story/108132p-97713c.html is the Daily News version. The Washington Post has a story on Libeskind, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A39481-2003Aug9.html that of course ignores the rebuilding movement and the phoniness of the selection process. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A42094-2003Aug10.html is about slurry wall engineer George Tamaro,with more overtones of Libeskind-is-a-done-deal despite its concession that potential disaster may possibly result from leaving the wall exposed. The annivwersary observations for the attacks will be smaller this year,as we always knew they would be.The megamemorialists are planning to mount a quiet protest in the name of keeping the footprints free of anything of non-memorial function. Bloomberg wants the "Tribute in Light" to become an anniversary tradition.(Why not meetings atop lit-up real towers??) We're looking for input on setting our next rally date. Weekend or weekday? We are hopeful of some NY Times coverage of the WTCRM before or on the second anniversary of the attacks...of course we have to do our best to escape a these-fools-living-in-the-past image (which might be what's in the best interest of their real estate development agenda). See you on the 111th floor on 9-11-11! -=-=- The World Trade Center towers MUST rise again, at least as tall as before...or terror has triumphed.