16 YEARS ON,

A perpetual state of high alert is the new normal for most New Yorkers

NEW YORK

IT’S a typical late summer weekend in New York’s Times Square, and tourists from around the world are snapping pictures beneath the commercial hub’s iconic neon billboards — watched closely by a heavy contingent of police.

Four cruisers are parked in the middle of the busy intersection, and pedestrian zones have been surrounded by barriers to stop cars from ramming the crowd, a mode of attack favoured by violent extremists in recent years.

“I don’t like to come to places like this,” says Sue Garcia, a massage therapist from Brooklyn.

“Or, anywhere where incidents have happened repeatedly — the fear comes to mind.”

Fear of another 9/11, the deadliest terrorist assault in history, when almost 3,000 lives were extinguished, many in the rubble of the World Trade Center.

For New Yorkers who lost loved ones, narrowly survived or just witnessed the event, memories remain fresh and old wounds are reopened on its anniversary. And, a perpetual state of high alert is the new normal.

Garcia, now 33, was a high schooler when the planes slammed into the Twin Towers.