brewster wrote:
I completely disagree with Banksy, I don't hate the way it looks, I hate that it exists, or at least that it was paid for with public money. There was no reason to build it except we needed another big penis in the sky to show our national manhood, or the terrorists win. The PA had no business getting into a giant commercial real estate project to begin with 60 years ago, and had sensibly gotten out before 9/11. Then they weaseled their way back in to build another money pit with our cash.

BTW, according to a PA history, Empire on the Hudson, the only reason they conceived the WTC was that by the late 50's they were swimming in cash from the airports and river crossings, and if they didn't do something with it the city was going to insist on taking it for mass transit.

Bogart wrote:
He is right. Do you remember the proposals for the WTC? Each was exciting in its own way and offered architecture that would become a world icon.

The process that came up with this design, dominated by Silverstein, betrayed the city by erecting a dull, corporate tower with an odd spire awkwardly tacked on so they could say the building is 1776 feet tall.

hero69 wrote:
NYC could not insist on taking PA cash as it is governemde by the states of NY/NJ. am i missing something?

By the early 1950s, however, the Port agency?s coffers brimmed with auto and truck tolls, while suburban rail lines faded financially; and now commuter groups and local elected officials began to target the Port Authority as both a cause of the transit problem and as a solution?particularly if it would transfer a substantial share of its ?profits? to the needy rail lines.16 In responding to the public demand for action, Tobin and his aides showed elements of the strategic skill displayed in the earlier airport and bus-terminal battles: They encouraged the creation of a bi?state commission that could study the transit problem; and then they provided most of its funds, but only after the commission agreed to give the Port Authority an important role in shaping the studies. As a result, its officials were able to ensure that the reports would not propose that the Port Authority have a major role in nancing the commuter rail system. Instead, the 1957 and 1958 commission reports recommended that the citizens of the 17 counties in the study area form a transit district and tax themselves in order to subsidize and improve the commuter rail system.

Unfortunately for Tobin and his colleagues, that stratagem was unsuccessful. New Jersey?s state legislature rejected the tax district, and critics of the Port agency introduced a bill that would direct the Port Authority itself to ?develop, improve and coordinate? rail passenger operations in the bi-state region. Testifying at a hearing in Trenton in November 1958, Tobin argued that his agency did not have the funds to take on that large task, and in a desperate plea for absolution, he concluded, ?I think the Port Authority has done everything that it can to help try to find a solution. . . . We have nothing more to contribute to this problem.?17

Traditionally, the state?s governors had accepted the Port Authority?s position that it should not throw its energies and cash into rail transit. By 1958, however, several of the commuter railroads were heading toward bankruptcy, and the states were under pressure to find a way to save commuter service. In the fall of 1958, Nelson Rockefeller was elected governor of New York, after campaigning on a pledge to take action to meet the commuter crisis; and with service on the New lersey rail lines deteriorating, its governor, Robert Meyner, also began to look for ways to use surpluses from road-building authorities to help underwrite rail transit deficits. Since the governors could use the veto power to force the Port Authority to allocate resources to the rail crisis, the agency now faced a far more credible threat than it had in recent decades.18

Meanwhile, the Port Authority?s yearly reserves had been growing at an alarming rate?alarming because large surpluses would make the agency especially vulnerable to demands that its ?excess? funds be siphoned off to pay for rail commuter service. In 1956, the agency?s reserves had totaled $37 million; by 1958 they had reached more than $64 million; in 1960 they would be nearly $80 million. As those totals continued to rise, the pressures to use its funds to meet rail deficits might become overwhelming; and, once the agency?s revenues were directed toward the ?bottomless pit" of rail transit deficits, would there be anything left for new projects in other areas, where the Port agency could see greater benefits for itself and for the region? One might reasonably wonder. In 1958 those rail deficits probably totaled more than $140 million a year, and to saddle the Port Authority with substantial portions of that total was a gloomy prospect.19
With this rail-transit cloud overhead, what could the Port Authority do? There were at least two possible lines of response. First, Tobin and his aides could have drawn upon their experience in the 1930s, when they had constructed an alliance to meet FDR?s challenge on tax-exempt bonds, and in the 19405, when they had built a coalition which could ensure adequate nancing for airport modernization and operation. From this perspective, they might have sought to persuade state officials to join in a wide-ranging coalition to maintain the region?s rail service?offering to use some Port Authority moneys, with restrictions so the agency could still act energetically in other areas, if the governors also agreed to use substantial state and local tax funds. Prospects for success of such a joint venture were uncertain?but in its battles against FDR, and against the airlines in the 1940s, the Port Authority had also faced large odds.20
Alternatively, Tobin and his aides could seek new projects outside the rail-transit area?projects large enough that they might absorb a major portion of those surpluses, thus undercutting the argument that the states could rely on the Port agency?s funds to solve the rail problem. Embracing this option, they directed their energies to two projects that were likely to absorb the agency?s growing revenues, and that were also viewed as beneficial to the region?s economy?a world trade center in New York, and an immense new airport in New Iersey. In the paragraphs below, both developments are summarized. I begin with the trade center, which soon became intermeshed with the rail issue.

hero69 wrote:
NYC could not insist on taking PA cash as it is governemde by the states of NY/NJ. am i missing something?

Bike_Lane wrote:
Quote:

Prismatic wrote:
Hes not the only one and it cost $1 billion to build it.

4 billion. 1 WTC cost $4 billion (so far). It's the most expensive building ever constructed on earth, though another building may soon pass it--the WTC PATH station. Banksy's right, but we're not allowed to criticize because it's WTC.

Prismatic wrote:
Hes not the only one and it cost $1 billion to build it.