NEW YORK, Sept. 10, 2006
About That 'Hole In The Ground'
Ray Nagin's Crack About World Trade Center Site Has Sting Of Truth
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Play CBS Video Video The Future Of Ground Zero Only On The Web: CBSNews.com's Christine Lagorio reports on the past, present and future of the Freedom Tower at Ground Zero.
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Video Remembering 9/11 Relatives and friends of the victims of 9/11 will gather for a ceremony commemorating the fifth anniversary of the attacks. Bianca Solorzano reports from Ground Zero.
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Video 2001: 9/11 Attacks This Week In History: President Bush and other senior officials attended a prayer service at the Washington National Cathedral to remember the victims of the 9/11 attacks.
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Ground zero is seen after a ceremony in which President Bush and Laura Bush placed wreaths at the footprints of the World Trade Center buildings, Sunday, Sept 10, 2006. This view shows the slurry wall from above, looking down at construction at the excavation work, which began 4 1/2 years after 9/11. (AP)
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New York State Gov. George Pataki gives a television interview across from Ground Zero on the eve of the fifth anniversary of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, Sunday, Sept. 10, 2006, in New York. (AP)
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World Trade Center 7, right, was the last building to collapse as a result of the World Trade Center attacks and the first to be permanently rebuilt. It rises in the New York skyline above ground zero at dusk, Monday, May 22, 2006. (AP Photo/Kathy Willens)
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Visitors to ground zero can see a timeline of rebuilding and, before the official memorial, "Reflecting Absence," is built, view a display of photographs of the attacks and aftermath. (CBS/Christine Lagorio)
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Five years after 9/11, the Lower Manhattan skyline is starting to look normal again. Julieta Sequera, 38, is moving to New York City to work in finance, and wants to see a new "business building" at the World Trade Center site. (CBS/Christine Lagorio)
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Interactive On Sacred Ground From redevelopment to memorials, see the designs and follow the progress at the attack sites.
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Interactive Virtual Tour Models, maps, audio reports and a 360-degree view show the changes at Ground Zero five years later.
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Photos Images: Five Years Later Remembering the victims of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and the heroes who perished trying to save them.
Still, the news isn’t all bad by any means. The Manhattan neighborhoods around the World Trade Center are thriving. Wall Street and the New York Stock Exchange have largely recovered, and are guarded by top-notch security. A new emergency command center in Brooklyn has replaced the one destroyed in the old 7 World Trade Center. And a glassy new 7 WTC building has been erected and is open for occupancy.
But Ground Zero remains a gaping wound to New Yorkers and visitors alike. It’s not just the undeveloped pit itself. The absence of the landmark towers from the Manhattan skyline is a constant, unpleasant reminder of that tragic day.
"I love the financial district, and how powerful it is, but I wish they would build another business tower there, because that's what it used to be," Julieta Sequera, a 38-year-old mortgage broker who recently moved to New York, said as she gazed at the lower Manhattan skyline from the Brooklyn Bridge. "Right now it's just so empty."
At Ground Zero over the Labor Day weekend, crowds took in a small exhibit of 9/11-themed photographs that hung on the metal fence on one side of the pit.
"What kind of building should go there? That's a difficult question, but it needs a building," said Michele Moschini, a 22-year-old student visiting from Italy, turned and said to his friend Angelo Lorusso, 23.
"The most important thing is to keep the memory alive. They need to think about that." Lorusso said.
Alan Toth, 51, who was visiting from Los Angeles, said: "Not every building has to have a dollar sign on it. It's not a race to have every new building be taller or bigger. People here don’t care any longer about the concrete and glass."
Toth was sightseeing with Colleen Edwards, a 39-year-old urban planning aficionado who works in construction. She agreed with Toth that a large green space or park would be a nice addition to Lower Manhattan, but she said there was too much at stake for the developers, New York City and the country not to erect a new tower.
"Isn’t it a symbol of a country’s own strength to be able to rebuild?" Edwards asked.
By Christine Lagorio
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