Date: Fri, 9 Sep 2005 23:12:16 -0400 (EDT)
From: Louis Epstein 
Subject: WTC Rebuilding #389:Anniversary Approaches


Sunday will mark four years since the Towers were destroyed.

This past week ground was broken for the new PATH terminal,
and the officials,keen as always to foster the illusion of
their mistaken plans possessing irresistible momentum,speak
of groundbreakings in the next six months for the FT and memorial.
http://nydailynews.com/09-07-2005/news/story/343938p-293668c.html
(Of course,they had a supposed "groundbreaking" for the FT more
than a year ago,before they admitted it was unbuildable...)

Bloomberg took the occasion to plead for donations to fund
the hideous official memorial,and family groups opposed to it
are going ahead with their September 10th demonstration.

The cultural conference that has ruffled many feathers
continues to generate news:
http://nydailynews.com/front/story/342393p-292318c.html

AS NOTED...AT 11 AM SEPTEMBER 11TH I'd like to get together
with pro-rebuilders at our traditional demonstration site at
City Hall Park...wear shirts,pins,whatever...if you have signs,
bring them...we won't be doing the table-and-speech thing but
I'll bring my petition clipboard...in case I meet willing people
who haven't already signed!

Once we've gathered we can walk to the WTC site as a group.

Tean Twin Towers has extended the deadline for their
Yamasaki-clone design competition (which is not the
WTCRM's competition despite the confusing name) to
October 28.They've added a row of design pictures to
their website but haven't made clear if these are
contest entries...some are familiar but not all.

Ken Gardner's ally Rosaleen Tallon got an Op-Ed column in
the Post,which Peter Walukiewicz sent me:

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Thu, 08 Sep 2005 11:49:12 -0400
Subject: Story from NYPOST.COM from Peter Walukiewicz

New York Post Online Edition

Peter thought you would find this story from NYPOST.COM interesting:

BEYOND BLAME
By ROSALEEN TALLON
OUR country mourns the loss of thousands of lives again. Our hearts are
aching for those who never got a chance to say good-bye. Our nation is
again grappling with hard questions and seeking answers. What went wrong?

My only sibling, Sean, was killed in the terror attacks of 9/11. He was
a firefighter and U.S. Marine Corps reservist. In the privacy of my own
heart, I have tried to blame only the terrorists, but I know that my
government played a role in his death. From Mayor Rudy Giuliani and Fire
Commissioner Thomas Von Essen not procuring the proper radios for my
brother and his fellow firefighters, to President Bill Clinton ignoring
the build-up of al Qaeda, to the FBI dropping the ball with Mohammed
Atta, it is obvious that governmental preparedness and protection of
its citizens from terror was unacceptable.

It is also obvious that governmental prevention of unnecessary loss of
life in the face of natural disaster was unacceptable. It was known to
government officials that there were weaknesses in the levees for years.
Why weren't these weaknesses addressed long before Hurricane Katrina?

As my brother would have said, "It's done." The hurricane has passed, the
WTC has fallen. But we are left to find answers. We are left to make it
better. We are left to rebuild.

It is my solemn wish that the rebuilding effort that commences in New
Orleans will be honorable and something to be proud of, something that
gives comfort to those who lost so much and hope to the nation that
grieves with them.

Unfortunately, if I look to how we are rebuilding Ground Zero for some
indication as to how the New Orleans rebuild will go, I can't feel too
positive. I am ashamed of the current rebuilding effort in New York.

What are we rebuilding in New York City? The Lower Manhattan Development
Corp. has planned an underground memorial and an underground museum to
the lost souls and tragedy of 9/11, with no above-ground remembrance of
what happened there.

There will be no damaged facades to gaze upon and no trace of many other
historical 9/11 artifacts as you walk through the pretty park with two
water pools. The site will be sanitized of the human tragedy that
occurred there. You will have to go under the ground to see the facade
ruins and to remember 9/11.

Prominence will be given to an International Freedom Center that focuses
on all other events of history and thereby minimizes the event that
occurred at this site as just another event in history. This embedding of
9/11 within the context of world history as part of man's march toward
freedom will further sanitize the area of the tragedy that occurred
there.

The centerpiece LMDC building, the Freedom Tower, has undergone so many
redesigns that it begs the question: Why was it ever accepted in the
first place? It is a fearful and poor attempt to replace our Twin Towers
with a look-alike of just one.

The base of this tower is 20 stories of windowless concrete, reminiscent
of the Soviet Union and its walls of concrete. Is that the new image of
our freedom -- fortresses and bunkers?

Along with the "Freedom Fort," five mediocre 50-story slanted-roof
buildings are planned to replace the southern anchors of the city's
skyline. How do slanted roofs fit with the area's proud architecture?

Who are we, America? How is all of this happening right before our eyes,
New York? What are we becoming, and what will we look like to the world?

My brother was taken from me, and our skyline was destroyed, by
terrorists. Instead of placing an appropriate memorial to this event and
its victims using the actual artifacts that tell the story in the light
of day, these artifacts are going to be buried under the ground. Instead
of rebuilding our Twin Towers safer and stronger, we are building
farcical buildings like the Freedom Tower and the International Freedom
Center.

In another 10 years, when we reap the new World Trade Center that the
LMDC has sown, are we yet again going to ask, "What went wrong?"

I am already ashamed.

Rosaleen Tallon is co-director of wtctowersmemorial.org.
---------- End forwarded message ----------

I regret the portrayal of the official plan's triumph as inevitable
by someone working to promote an alternative,even as I differ with
some details of that alternative in terms of what I'd prefer.There
are no areas in which the official plan is better than the Gardner
plan.

Whatever our preferred new-Towers plan we must continue to be loud,
we must continue to be visible.That we've had four years without
success must not dissuade us from opposing a failure that could last
for centuries.Our opponents may be in the position of power but
their every effort has been a shambles.

Will I see you Sunday?

-=-=-
The World Trade Center towers MUST rise again,
at least as tall as before...or terror has triumphed.