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  #61  
Old Posted Apr 16, 2009, 8:20 PM
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Update from morrongiello...(April 16)




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  #62  
Old Posted Apr 24, 2009, 12:55 PM
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http://www.nydailynews.com/news/2009...wtc_trans.html

After more than three years and $1 billion, Port Authority backtracks on WTC transit hub, again

BY Douglas Feiden
April 24th 2009

After more than three years and $1 billion, the Port Authority is again reinventing the way it will build the troubled transportation hub planned for Ground Zero.

The agency Thursday said it's removing its general contractor from the grandiose project that has repeatedly busted its budget and muffed its deadlines - and will take over the daunting task of managing construction itself.

At stake is the $3.2 billion budget and 2014 opening date of a four-level, Santiago Calatrava-designed mega-terminal with soaring wings and a retractable roof.

In a struggle to stay on track, the PA is opening up all future work to competitive bidding - a move it nixed just seven months ago, when it said such a step would "increase project risk" and "add uncertainty."

The Port Authority is also ousting Phoenix Constructors - a joint venture of four industry giants with whom it had a tortured relationship - from its dual role as construction manager and general contractor.

The PA says it will tackle the job.

The new plan opens the PATH terminal project to competitive bidding while letting Phoenix wrap up its work on underground pedestrian tunnels, below-grade steel and other aspects of the job.
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  #63  
Old Posted Apr 27, 2009, 5:47 PM
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For All who haven't noticed, 2 new Eartcams have been installed, should be intresting now http://www.earthcam.com/search/ft_se...+tower&x=0&y=0 , or atleast it says 'NEW!'..
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  #64  
Old Posted Apr 27, 2009, 11:26 PM
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Update from morrongiello (April 27)




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  #65  
Old Posted Apr 30, 2009, 5:34 AM
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Update from morrongiello (April 29)




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  #66  
Old Posted May 1, 2009, 4:12 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by 2-TOWERS View Post
what is that other square hole on the upper part of the memorial?
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Originally Posted by drewmandan View Post
That's the second memorial. You see, towers 1 and 2 were very close together.
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Originally Posted by JSsocal View Post
I think he was asking what the hole that was directly next to the north footprint was, and to answer his question, I am pretty sure it is being used to lower large memorial items into place in the levels below
Right. The Twin Towers were spaced about 100 feet apart, and arranged so that the edge of one tower's wall was on the same line as the other tower's opposite wall. I've done up a quick recap of the site; the new memorial footprints will correspond roughly to the actual locations of the Twin Towers which I've outlined in red, with the new towers surrounding:



You can even see the outlines of the old foundations, inside my red boxes.

Now, from the looks of the most recently posted images, they don't appear to have really made much progress on the south memorial footprint yet, and I tend to agree with JSsocal's theory.
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  #67  
Old Posted May 1, 2009, 4:30 AM
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Rail building roof changes

Section of roof being removed on Thursday. What's up?

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  #68  
Old Posted May 1, 2009, 4:53 AM
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[QUOTE=Now, from the looks of the most recently posted images, they don't appear to have really made much progress on the south memorial footprint yet, and I tend to agree with JSsocal's theory.[/QUOTE]

Well I checked back at WNY, and I found the post that talked about it.
This is from "ZenSteelDude," who knows a heluva lot about the project...

Quote:
"I compared the renderings that RKOwens4 posted with the prints and they appear to be very accurate. I'm sure many have noticed the big holes in the decking on the west side ( above the main gallery) they're for lowering some of the larger pieces of steel into the Museum."
And as for the smaller hole next to the future fulton street, that will be an emergency exit.

Again, thanks be to Zensteeldude
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  #69  
Old Posted May 5, 2009, 11:52 AM
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http://www.nypost.com/seven/05052009...bub_167652.htm



May 5, 2009

Quote:
NOW that the Port Au thority has scuttled its exclusive contracting arrangement with Phoenix Constructors, a moment of truth is approaching for the PA's over-budget, behind-schedule World Trade Center Transportation Hub -- aka the new PATH terminal at Ground Zero designed by Santiago Calatrava.

Dropping the Phoenix joint venture of four major contractors, a step that puts the PA directly in charge of managing the terminal's development, should streamline the process.

That's essential for the entire WTC site -- the Hub is so big, with so much sprawling, below-grade infrastructure, that a failure to move it forward can stall everything around it.

PA Executive Director Chris Ward is eager to get on with the heavy lifting. He told us last week the authority will soon bid out the three biggest parts of the job.

They are: Bringing the structure up to street level, building the permanent "box" for the MTA's No. 1 subway line, which runs above part of the Calatrava station's underground portion, and, most visibly and dramatically, constructing the above-ground, winged "oculus" that's the new terminal's public face.


Thanks in part to reduced demand, construction costs have been falling after years of escalation, and the PA hopes to take advantage of the situation.

But it will be interesting indeed to see whether the PA gets competitive bids low enough to keep the already far over-budget project within its current, total $3.2 billion estimate. (The PA has spent or committed about $1 billion of that sum on portions of the job already underway.)

"Even with design modifications they've made, this project is still very, very challenging," a construction industry source buzzed. "It has tough engineering issues both below ground and above."

Remember, the MTA had to scuttle the design for its own Fulton Street Transit Center nearby two years ago when bids came in far above the $850 million it could afford.

The catastrophic results are an empty pit where viable buildings once stood, an underground tangle of platforms as confusing as ever and no plans or budget yet to fix the mess.

History needn't repeat itself with the WTC terminal. With so much riding on its completion, let's hope it does not.
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  #70  
Old Posted May 5, 2009, 10:46 PM
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Originally Posted by QuarterMileSidewalk View Post
Am I reading this picture right? I was always under the assumption that the memorial corresponded with the exact location and dimensions of the original WTC towers.
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  #71  
Old Posted May 6, 2009, 4:11 AM
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^^^Yes and no, the picture above isn't exact and not 100% to scale, however, the memorial pools are a little bit smaller then the actual footprints themselves. (Logistical problems)
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  #72  
Old Posted May 6, 2009, 11:15 PM
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Overview of the site, posted on wtc.com (May 1)

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  #73  
Old Posted May 8, 2009, 6:40 PM
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Update from morrongiello (May 6)




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  #74  
Old Posted May 9, 2009, 4:01 AM
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http://www.crainsnewyork.com/article...FREE/905089974

Architect Calatrava calls transit hub a challenge
Renowned architect seeks to honor memory of those who perished at WTC.


By Theresa Agovino
May 8, 2009

Renowned architect Santiago Calatrava said that overcoming the physical challenges involved in designing the transit hub at the World Trade Center site has been the most difficult endeavor of his 28-year career but that being a part of the project has been a privilege

“It has been very difficult, very challenging,” said the Spanish-born architect. “I’m honored to be a part of the whole process.”

Mr. Calatrava said that devising the plan for the hub, a glass and steel structure which resembles a dove, was extraordinarily complex because trains will keep running through the area during construction.

“That is difficult to work around,” he said, adding that the relatively small size of the WTC site creates a formidable landscape for construction.

On an emotional level, Mr. Calatrava says the project presented an entirely different kind of test. “Everyone has a memory of Sept 11 and what it means,” he said, noting that people come to the site with very different expectations. He also said while designing the structure he was always aware that his client, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, lost numerous employees in the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks and wanted to insure his vision would honor their memory. The Port lost 84 employees that day.

Last year, Mr. Calatrava had to revise the hub’s design because it was running over budget and behind schedule. However, the architect downplayed the changes, saying the hub is the seventh station he’s designed and such shifts are a normal part of the process. Even with the changes, the hub’s budget ballooned to $3.2 billion from $2 billion originally. It’s now slated to be completed by the end of 2013 at the earliest, instead of 2011.

Mr. Calatrava declined to comment on the stalemate between the Port and developer Larry Silverstein, who is planning three office towers on the site, which could delay construction.

“I am just a simple architect,” he said.

An exhibition featuring a model of the transit hub, Mr. Calatrava’s sketches of the project and a video will run at the Queen Sofia Spanish Institute from Saturday, May 8 to Monday, Aug 13. The exhibit will showcase how the hub’s design evolved as well as some of Mr. Calatrava’s other projects.
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  #75  
Old Posted May 12, 2009, 12:24 AM
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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/11/ar...a.html?_r=1&hp

Post-9/11 Realities Warp a Soaring Design


The architect Santiago Calatrava with his current model for a transportation hub at ground zero in downtown Manhattan.

By NICOLAI OUROUSSOFF
May 10, 2009

When Santiago Calatrava unveiled his design for a luminous glass-and-steel transportation hub for ground zero in January 2004, government officials touted it as a 21st-century version of Grand Central Terminal — one of the few bright spots in a development plan crippled by politics, petty self-interests and the weight of the site’s history.

We should have known better. During the next several years the project’s cost spiraled to $3.2 billion from $2 billion. The scheduled completion date was delayed, first by a couple of years, then several more. Mr. Calatrava, determined to save his design, worked slavishly to get the budget under control. In a misguided effort to avoid more controversy, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey enveloped the project in secrecy, essentially shutting the public out of the design process.

But even for those of us who had given up on the idea that anything good would ever emerge from ground zero, the unveiling of an elaborate new model of the revised design on Saturday at the Queen Sofía Spanish Institute was heart wrenching.

The model gives us the clearest picture yet of Mr. Calatrava’s vision. Dozens of minor improvements have been made; his structural pyrotechnics look as dazzling as ever.


Even so, Mr. Calatrava remains unable to overcome the project’s fatal flaw: the striking incongruity between the extravagance of the architecture and the limited purpose it serves. The result is a monument to the creative ego that celebrates Mr. Calatrava’s engineering prowess but little else. And it reinforces the likelihood that one day, decades from now, when the site is finally completed, it will stand as a testament to our inability to put self-interests aside in the face of one of America’s greatest tragedies.

The seeds of the design’s failure were there from the very beginning, in the byzantine politics of ground zero. At Grand Central the main hall plugs directly into a dense network of tracks. The power of the space stems as much from the constant movement of people across it — spilling down its grand staircases and in and out of the gates — as from the great vaulted spaces that frame it. It is a stunning tribute to a mobile society and the freedom that implies.

An obvious place to put a station at ground zero would have been at the northeast corner of the former World Trade Center site, just above the PATH tracks and the No. 1 subway. But by the time the Port Authority began planning the hub, this area had been declared sacred ground, and the loaded politics surrounding the site made it impossible to rearrange any of the pieces. Instead the hub was set on a large plaza on the other side of Greenwich Street, where it could connect to the N and R subways and the Fulton Street subway station further to the east.

To enclose the hub, Mr. Calatrava created a vast central hall, something like Grand Central Terminal’s, 50 feet below ground and underneath a soaring elliptical glass-and-steel dome. The dome was supported by a system of curved white beams that suggested the rib cage of a gigantic prehistoric bird. Two enormous wings rise out of the top of this form, partly sheltering a plaza on either side.

The magic of the design was a structural sleight of hand. In a traditional vaulted roof the two sides press in toward the central spine, which helps support them. Mr. Calatrava’s mechanical roof would open along this spine — with its wings moving up and down — and when it did, the entire structure would seem to be defying gravity.

Yet the impressive roof trick also served to detract attention from what was going on underground. To bridge the distance between his central hall and the trains Mr. Calatrava was forced to create a second hall that serves the PATH platforms at one end. At the other, a doorway connects to a corridor leading to the Fulton Street subway station a block away. The massive domed hall becomes a void at the center of a convoluted underground labyrinth that stretched four blocks from Battery Park City to Broadway.

The reason for the hall’s enormous scale was further put into question when state and city officials dropped the idea of creating a link to La Guardia and Kennedy airports. Though Mr. Calatrava’s hall was 14,000 square feet bigger than Grand Central’s, it would now serve only a small fraction of the passengers.


Mr. Calatrava has been struggling to solve these problems for years now. The model at the Spanish Institute shows a new version of the roof structure, which will have fixed wings to cut down on costs. The entries to the No. 1 and the N and R trains have been moved to the main axis at either end of the hall, making them more accessible. An elegant grand staircase now leads up to the Fulton Street corridor.

But more often than not, what you feel is the immense strain Mr. Calatrava and his clients are under to try to justify the hall’s existence. Retail space has been added along the base of the great hall and along a second-floor balcony, which should draw a few visitors but risks transforming the entire space into one of the world’s most excessive shopping malls.

And in a particularly perverse decision PATH riders won’t be able to get from the train platforms directly to the street. Instead they will have to walk halfway along the hall’s upper balcony and past dozens of shops before exiting into one of the flanking towers — a suffocating experience no matter how beautiful the spaces turn out to be.

These problems are amplified by Mr. Calatrava’s seeming refusal to disturb the sculptural purity of his creation. Some have already pointed out that only two small entries, at each end of the dome, connect the main plaza to the hall, as if the architect were afraid of exposing his inner world to the chaos outside. I noticed something else on my visit to the show: a ring of marble benches now surrounds the base of the glass dome, so that standing in the plaza you will be able to see only a small segment of the great hall below. Instead the eye is drawn up to the grandeur of Mr. Calatrava’s structure. Life is secondary.

All of this would be discouraging enough given the number of other worthy transportation projects in New York City. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority had to redesign its new Fulton Street station to keep within its tight budget, even though it will serve thousands more passengers a day. Despite years of planning, Pennsylvania Station’s cramped dehumanizing spaces remain one of the most shameful chapters in the city’s architectural history, partly because authorities can’t find a way to pay for a renovation.

Mr. Calatrava’s design also embodies a deeper, more troubling history: the toxic climate of those first years after the Sept. 11 attacks. While the city grieved, politicians were vowing to rebuild as fast as possible, as if that would somehow accelerate the healing process. Practical considerations were set aside. Jingoism ruled. Egotism dominated over softer, gentler voices.

Under such conditions it should surprise no one that what once promised to be one of ground zero’s most triumphant architectural achievements is hollow at its core.


A computer rendering of the interior of the World Trade Center transit hub as set out in Santiago Calatrava’s current design .
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  #76  
Old Posted May 12, 2009, 12:38 PM
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http://www.artdaily.org/index.asp?in...&int_new=30783



Santiago Calatrava, the world-renowned architect who has designed some of the most beautiful structures of our time, is the subject of a new exhibition, Santiago Calatrava: World Trade Center Transportation Hub, at New York City’s Queen Sofía Spanish Institute, a private non-profit Spanish cultural center, through August 31, 2009.

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey commissioned Santiago Calatrava, S.A. to design the project in association with Downtown Design Partnership, a joint venture of DMJM + Harris and STV Group, Inc. In January 2004, when Santiago Calatrava unveiled his plans for the transportation hub, the daring design was seen as a symbol of renewal and hope after the tragedy of September 11, 2001. Since then, Santiago Calatrava has recommended some adjustments to the design to save time and money while preserving the overall integrity of the original design. The exhibition will be an opportunity for commuters, subway riders and pedestrians to see that Calatrava’s design has transcended the complex challenges of the site and to view the development of this soaring, spectacular design which will significantly improve mass-transit connections across Lower Manhattan.

Santiago Calatrava: World Trade Center Transportation Hub will showcase architectural models along with a multimedia presentation and reinforce the evocative image of “a bird being released from a child’s hand”. This exhibition also presents selected American projects of Santiago Calatrava’s celebrated buildings.
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  #77  
Old Posted May 14, 2009, 10:44 PM
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MULTI-AGENCY EMERGENCY RESPONSE DRILL PLANNED FOR WTC PATH STATION ON SUNDAY MORNING, MAY 17
Date: May 13, 2009
Press Release Number: 55
WTC PATH Service to be Suspended from 6 to 11:30 a.m.

A major, multi-agency emergency response drill will be held at the World Trade Center PATH Station on Sunday morning, May 17.

The drill will require the World Trade Center PATH Station to be closed to customers from 6 to 11:30 a.m. on Sunday. PATH trains traveling from Newark to the World Trade Center will terminate at PATH's Exchange Place Station in Jersey City during the drill. Customers bound for Manhattan can take PATH's Journal Square to 33rd Street line via Hoboken, which will operate normally. All other PATH service will operate normally. Customers traveling between New Jersey and Lower Manhattan should visit http://www.panynj.gov/Commutingtrave...ure-may17.html to view alternate travel options.

In addition, Vesey Street from West Street to Church Street will be closed to pedestrians during the drill. Other neighboring streets will be closed to vehicles during the drill to accommodate emergency vehicles, which will be responding with lights and sirens as they would in an actual emergency.

The drill will begin at 8 a.m. and involve hundreds of emergency responders from the Port Authority Police, NYPD and FDNY. It is being coordinated jointly by the Port Authority and the New York City Office of Emergency Management. The drill will last for approximately two hours.

Media interested in covering the drill are asked to report to the corner of West Broadway and Vesey Street no later than 7:30 a.m. No vehicles will be allowed in this area. All media equipment will need to be carried to this location.

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey operates many of the busiest and most important transportation links in the region. They include John F. Kennedy International, Newark Liberty International, LaGuardia, Stewart International and Teterboro airports; AirTrain JFK and AirTrain Newark; the George Washington Bridge and Bus Station; the Lincoln and Holland tunnels; the three bridges between Staten Island and New Jersey; the PATH (Port Authority Trans-Hudson) rapid-transit system; the Port Authority-Downtown Manhattan Heliport; Port Newark; the Elizabeth-Port Authority Marine Terminal; the Howland Hook Marine Terminal on Staten Island; the Brooklyn Piers/Red Hook Container Terminal; and the Port Authority Bus Terminal in midtown Manhattan. The agency also owns the 16-acre World Trade Center site in Lower Manhattan.

The Port Authority is financially self-supporting and receives no tax revenue from either state.


im sorry i couldnt find the forum for the path station so i will post it here
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  #78  
Old Posted May 17, 2009, 11:58 PM
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Some images from the emergency drill can be seen here...
http://www.1010wins.com/pages/441133...tentId%3D55064
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  #79  
Old Posted May 18, 2009, 10:32 PM
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Update from morrongiello (May 18)




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  #80  
Old Posted May 21, 2009, 1:17 PM
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http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/...er_budget.html

WTC may go $1.1B over budget: Report rips poor management of PA as costs spiral out of control

BY Douglas Feiden
May 21st 2009


New York's Big Boondoggle just got bigger.

The World Trade Center Transportation Hub is near-certain to bust its $3.2 billion budget - and there's a chance it will cost more than $4.3 billion to build, the Daily News has learned.

That's a spike of as much as $1.1 billion from the Port Authority's "clear-eyed" estimate of only eight months ago, a review of Hub costs obtained by The News under the Freedom of Information Act reveals.

The December report by the Federal Transit Administration says it's 90% certain the Port Authority will blow a June 2014 deadline for opening the Santiago Calatrava-designed megaterminal.

The FTA study also estimated there's a 50-50 chance the Hub could cost $3.8 billion, shattering its budget by $600 million - with no funding for the extra costs.

"Project costs significantly exceed available FTA and local funding," the 61-page consultant's study said.

The grim news comes as Mayor Bloomberg hosts a summit today at Gracie Mansion in a bid to mediate a ferocious war raging between the PA and developer Larry Silverstein over the future of the 16-acre site.

Ballooning costs at the Hub - and their impact on the rest of Ground Zero - will be a hot-button issue confronting Gov. Paterson, New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine and Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver at the parley.

The price tag is expected to keep soaring: Add in overall project costs, like the Hub's below-grade, octupuslike infrastructure, and the tab is 90% certain to exceed $4.4 billion, the FTA report estimates.

There's a 90% certainty that building the grandiose train hall and its infrastructure - largely to benefit New Jersey's PATH commuters - will cost three times the $1.5 billion spent for the original World Trade Center.


There's also a 10% chance that the so-called Grand Central Terminal of lower Manhattan will leap in cost to $5.4 billion.

The FTA ordered the risk review to examine the PA's Oct. 2 World Trade Center assessment report, which set new time lines and budgets and which the agency dubbed a "clear-eyed analysis" of site issues.

The FTA consultants, New York-based Jacobs Carter Burgess, faulted the PA for its performance and competence in the report, finding the project's management "has not been strong" with "poor project controls (largely due to lack of experienced project managers)."

Both the FTA and the PA minimized the risks documented in the report:

"We're confident that we've mitigated the risks. The bottom line is that the Hub is on schedule and on the budget that we announced in October," PA spokesman Stephen Sigmund said.

He said construction cost escalation was no longer a problem, and that key bid packages - like a $338 million contract for Hub steel - were coming in at or below PA estimates.

FTA officials said the project's $3.2 billion cost was "achievable" with risk-mitigation efforts.

Blown timetables have marred the project from the start. Its original completion date was 2006, then this year, then 2011 and now June 2014. The FTA's report now cites a 50-50 chance of a November 2014 opening and a possibility of a May 2015 debut.
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