By Julie Shapiro
Volume 21, Number 18 | The Newspaper of Lower Manhattan | Sept. 12 18, 2008
Port slows down W.T.C. work for residents
While the Port Authority looks for ways to speed up the rebuilding of the World Trade Center, one Port official said Monday that they are slowing some work to satisfy residents.
The Port Authority is more than 10 weeks late in excavating the sites for Tower 2 and the Tower 4 offset, and that’s no accident, said Glenn Guzi, a Port program manager.
“Frankly put, we’ve slowed it down,” Guzi told Community Board 1 Monday night.
Pat Moore, a C.B. 1 member who lives at 125 Cedar St. across from the site, nodded with approval. This was a far different response than the Port Authority gave last winter when they were under a similar deadline for turning the sites for Towers 3 and 4 over to Silverstein Properties. Back then, the Port pushed noisy jackhammering to 21 hours a day right outside Moore’s window.
“The world doesn’t understand why [the W.T.C. site] is not completed and further along,” Moore told Guzi at C.B. 1’s W.T.C. Redevelopment Committee meeting. “I hope you say to them there’s a community of people everyone encouraged to move down here, [and they] have to be taken into consideration.”
The Port was supposed to turn the sites for Tower 2 and the Tower 4 offset over to Silverstein on June 30 and has been paying them a $300,000-a-day penalty ever since, a total of more than $20 million. At the beginning of the summer, the Port said the sites would be ready by mid-August. Silverstein is building Towers 2, 3 and 4 once the Port excavates the sites.
The Tower 2 work will be done within a week, but the Tower 4 offset — the portion of the Tower 4 site that supports the 1/9 subway box — will take another two to six weeks to excavate, Guzi said. In addition to slowing work for the sake of residents, unexpectedly difficult field conditions also caused delays.
After the meeting, David Stanke, who also lives across from the site, said the Port should not use the community as an excuse.
“They put themselves in a position where they need to abuse us to get it done, and now they blame us for not letting them abuse us,” Stanke said. He thinks the Port Authority should have figured out a way to protect the residents while working as fast as they could to get the job done.
At a press conference on Wednesday, Mayor Michael Bloomberg put a more positive spin on the residents’ feelings on Lower Manhattan rebuilding.
“For residents, it’s been exciting,” he said. “Yes you have traffic and noise and construction…but everyone is thrilled to see it take place. It’s better than nothing happening.”
Something the residents weren’t excited about at Monday’s C.B. 1 meeting was the likely closure of Vesey St. between Church and W. Broadway. That block is already closed to traffic but is a major pedestrian corridor, particularly now that the temporary PATH entrance moved to Vesey St. and W. Broadway.
“We absolutely, completely understand this would not be an ideal situation,” Guzi said. “We know it would have an adverse impact…[but] safety is a paramount concern to the Port Authority.”
Guzi emphasized that the closure is not yet definite, but Quentin Brathwaite, assistant director of W.T.C. construction for the Port, described the closure as though it was a done deal.
Because the site for Tower 2 is excavated to 80 feet below street level, the only place for construction staging is on Vesey St. or the west side of Church St.
“We are going to need the only possible space available to us,” Brathwaite said of expanding the site into Vesey St.
To accommodate pedestrians, the Port is working with the city to widen sidewalks on a detour route along Church St., Barclay St. and W. Broadway, Brathwaite said.
Guzi promised to come back to the board before the closure is official.
Julie@DowntownExpress.com
