Architect Unveils
WTC Transit Hub Design

Jan. 23, 2004 - NEW YORK -- Rebuilding officials here pulled the curtain away on the design for a new $2 billion downtown Manhattan train station, the third large piece of the World Trade Center redevelopment puzzle.

Dressed in a pinstripe suit and gold tie, Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava showed off models and renderings for a glass-roofed, dove-shaped transit hub that real-estate investors hope will be a magnet that draws major corporate tenants to downtown Manhattan.

The gleaming white structure is set to rise 150 feet on the eastern flank of the 16-acre site, to nestle between towering skyscrapers. It will be wrapped in skeleton-like steel beams that fan out like massive wings. Between the beams, glass will allow sunlight to penetrate underground to the train platforms, 60 feet below the street. A retractable roof will open on fair-weather days.

At the presentation in lower Manhattan, Mr. Calatrava, known for his soaring transportation projects, drew a freehand sketch on a large poster board of his inspiration for the design: a child releasing a bird into the air. It represents, he said, "a new world of light, flight and hope."

Money for the station comes from the $20 billion promised to New York by the federal government following the Sept. 11, 2001, attack. The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which owns the WTC site, is in charge of the station's construction.

The World Trade Center Transit Hub, as it is being called, will serve the existing PATH train, which connects commuters to New Jersey, as well as several subway lines that run through the site. It also will accommodate yet-to-be-determined rail links to New York airports.

Below-ground pedestrian walkways will connect the terminal to local office buildings and a ferry terminal, as well as to a separate $750 million transit center being built a block away by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, the state agency that runs the city's subways.

A view from the floor of the proposed transit center

The train station unveiling follows closely on the heels of two other major elements for the site. A massive office building, called the "Freedom Tower," aims to be the tallest in the world. Next to that will be a permanent memorial to the victims of the attack, which will sit exactly where the Twin Towers stood.

Kent M. Swig, a real-estate investor whose company, Swig Burris Equities, has bought two lower Manhattan office buildings in the past six months, says the transit hub is key to competing with the Midtown market. "There's nothing more vital than getting that transit hub," he said. "It's going to have a huge impact delivering people into a safe, uplifting environment."

The Port Authority says the station will be completed in 2009. That would be exactly 100 years after the Hudson & Manhattan Railroad first brought commuter and freight service to the site that eventually became the World Trade Center.

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