For the magazine, I went down into the World Trade Pit this morning to cover the placing of the cornerstone for the Freedom Tower, the first building to rise on Ground Zero.
After their speeches, New York Mayor Bloomberg, New York Governor Pataki and New Jersey Governor McGreevey removed the velvet veil from the slab, which a crane then hoisted into a shallow hole. Out of context, the cornerstone resembles a headstone — a 20-ton headstone, but a headstone nonetheless.
Although conerstone-settings/groundbreakings traditionally signal the beginning of construction, they’re not getting down to business on the Freedom Tower until later this year or early 2005, and steel won’t go up until 2006.
But when it’s done in late 2008 or early 2009, it’ll be the tallest building in the world, at 1,776 feet and boast 2.6 million square feet of office space on 72 floors.
Maybe I would have felt differently about the event if I had been one of the several hundred there who lost a family member on September 11, but there wasn’t a single sentence spoken by the politicos there that didn’t contain a fatty slathering of patriotic hyperbole. It is annoying to try to report on an event where all the politicians are saying is “honor” and “freedom” and other such wispy nouns that send speechwriters into orgasmic shivers. More matter, less art, please.
Also, it was really hot in that pit, which didn’t help my mood any; nor did jostling with the dozens of other mediafolk that turned out for the event, although I do have plenty of photos of the backs of their swiftly darting heads to remember them by. I'm told there would have been even more media at the event had there not been the other big newsworthy story of the day to cover in Manhattan.
But when all is said and done, I can rest assured that someone, somewhere out there will likely pay good money for my special event press pass, should I opt to sell it on eBay.
God bless America!
Postscript: There's an interesting article about the cornerstone’s typeface over at Design Observer.