C.B. 1 committee praises transportation hub
Community Board 1 members expressed their seemingly unanimous approval of the new World Trade Center transportation hub’s most current design, at a meeting last week.
“It seems that the beautiful PATH station is something that everybody seems to agree on,” said board member Catherine McVay Hughes, who viewed the revised design at C.B.1’s WTC Redevelopment Committee meeting on Sept. 7. Construction on the modern transit station, which resembles a white bird taking flight, began this week.
Designed by Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava, the transportation hub, when completed, will connect Downtown PATH trains, subways and ferries. Calatrava made minor changes to the design that were released earlier this summer. The estimated cost of the project is $2 billion. The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey projects that 80,000 PATH commuters will use the facility every day, while a total of 250,000 pedestrians will utilize the complex daily. The project will create 10,000 construction jobs, said the Port’s Lou Menno, who presented the current design for the new transit hub to the committee.
Last Tuesday, Governor George Pataki, Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Senator Hillary Clinton, among others attended a groundbreaking ceremony for the new transit hub at the World Trade Center site. During a ceremony last week, Calatrava and his 10-year-old daughter released two doves.
—Ellen Keohane
