80-storey 3 World Trade Center opens 17 years later

NEW YORK: An 80-storey office building set to open this week at the World Trade Centre will be the third completed skyscraper at the site where the twin towers stood.

Today’s ribbon-cutting for the 329-metre-high 3 World Trade Centre marks a major step in the rebuilding of the site, stalled for years by disputes among government agencies, developer Larry Silverstein, insurers and 9/11 victims’ family members who wanted the entire site to be preserved as a memorial.

The 2.7 billion building has been the fifth-tallest building in New York City since construction topped out in 2016.

That designation seemed elusive in 2009 when the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which owns the site and was battling with Silverstein over costs associated with rebuilding, sought to reduce 3 World Trade to a four-storey “stump”.

After arbitration in the dispute between the developer and the property owner, construction started in 2010 but was halted at seven storeys because of a lack of financing.

The financial situation improved in 2012, Silverstein said. “It was like somebody came to us and said, ‘The curtain has gone up, you can now access this pool of financing.’”

The Port Authority’s executive director, Rick Cotton, joined the agency in 2017 and missed out on the fights with Silverstein. Cotton said the opening of 3 World Trade is “really a major transformative step in the ongoing evolution of the World Trade Centre from a construction site to an active, living, breathing cam- pus of office buildings and a memorial.”

Three World Trade’s lobby faces the National September 11 Museum. Wedged between the Santiago Calatrava-designed transportation hub and 4 World Trade Centre, the new building straddles a 17-storey “podium.” It boasts an annealed glass exterior with 10 000 glass panels that have been cooled slowly to reduce internal stress, meaning the glass shouldn’t break into shards if it is struck.

The still unfinished 2 World Trade is awaiting an anchor tenant and financing before it can be built beyond a stump.

PICTURE: AP 3 World Trade Centre, second from right, joins its neighbours One World Trade Centre, left, and 4 World Trade Centre, right, next to the September 11 Memorial and Museum in New York. The centre’s latest skyscraper opens Monday.