World Trade Center Regeneration (OUTLINE)
Mitchell Joachim
Advisors: Alex Krieger and Marco Cenzatti
Memorial Analysis Outline:
The idea of a memorial seems to consistently resonate amongst governing powers and the munificent public in the city of New York. It is the overwhelming consensus of American citizens that space should be set aside to memorialize the victims of September 11th. Any urban or architectural solution enacted that does not resolve the presence of a memorial will certainly be disregarding this general will of the public. The site of the previous World Trade Center needs a place of remembrance for those events, but should not be entirely limited to one program. Although an entire solution for the former WTC is necessary, mitigating the issues of a memorial is the constraint dealt with here. The criterion of the location, energy, and typology for a memorial fitting into the site is the bounds of this project. Considerations of other relevant projects in congruence with a memorial do not fall within the scope of this document. That is to say whatever interventions, built edifices, or landscape environments deemed worthy of this location should be discussed as complimentary elements in relation to the memorial. What is or is not appropriate for the site and a memorial, and how can this be determined? Therefore no-designed memorial per se¢ is being proposed but instead a coded list or theory of immanence, possibilities, and integrations.
The kinds of solutions and questions being asked here essentially dictate an approach to designing a memorial. Qualities and measurements of data extruded form the pre-existing structures will hope to reveal insights for a finer calibration of humane concerns. What did those buildings mean in terms of humanity and the domain in which we thrive? How can this be measured and contrasted to a mitigating alternate solution? Of course we can perform better today at planning/ designing solutions, but how can we prove this here ardently? Where did the WTC construct fail at providing humanly scaled benefits and conviviality for the people of the city? Will exploring the life support systems of those prior structures reveal an undergid of mistakes that lead to their demise? A visual model expressing the differences in the needs of old and the needs of today could stridently appeal to the ultimate designers of the entire site. Modeling an analysis of per-existing volumes of space, energy, and density will reveal the gross miscalculation of humane agendas needed to successfully fit a project to the surrounds. Also a second model of required goals to be met would offer precursor design solutions. For instance, can you possibly imagine designing a second new structure that moves nine million cubic feet of air per minute to cool fifty thousand office workers on a sunny day one thousand three hundred feet in the air? Should such conditions exist again or can these satanic mills of industry be reconfigured to address future generations? How would a memorial recognize both the horror of 911 and of the past attitude those buildings represented to the whole of humanity. Why is it appropriate to ask these questions, whom are we ultimately concerned with?
Memorials should not just simply encapsulate the past but bring resolve and offer consolation. They are not places for radicalism or political agendas. They are moments of solitude, peace, and evocation. Today the traumatized WTC survivors recount tales of narrow escape within the confines of the densest place on earth. Should a memorial recall the impenetrable, dark architecture that stood before or should it be a part of our enlightenment and healing? The Vietnam Memorial in Washington DC does not offer answers or retell events. How is this successful or is it? Minimalist granite plaques, religious archetypes, and over-scaled sculptures do not proactively engage humanity. They do not prevent the atrocities of yesterday form happening again. They better serve as geographical locators then cognitive accounts of history.
Perhaps the memorial for the WTC will usher in a new modality of thinking about the collective peoples of the earth. Dachau outside Munich in Germany is a preserved space for memorializing the holocaust. It also serves to actively record its entire history to date, so no such horror could happen again. Inclusive in the memorial at Dachau is a museum and an archive of the tragedy, as well as support for finding other perpetrators. One of the most powerful effects of Dachau is to see the piles of human shoes, clothing, teeth, and hair of the Jewish victims. What kinds of similar references could be made at WTC? A visual depicting the loss of thousands of people instantly is unfathomable, and arguably exists. What about qualifying measurements of the loss? Does a simple picture of four hundred fireman and rescue workers suffice or could that be expanded somehow? A new memorial must legibly underscore the very nature and entirety of the event and foreground the historical mistakes that made it possible. How this actualizes is to be scripted in later writing and models. |
