WTC transport hub unveiled - Front Page

Spanish-born architect Santiago Calatrava recently unveiled his design for a new World Trade Center Transportation Hub commissioned by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. Expected to cost approximately $2 billion, the hub will accommodate 250,000 commuters daily, including those using PATH train service between New York and New Jersey, numerous city subway lines and connections to the three principal regional airports.

Unlike most of the other recent presentations for new Lower Manhattan building projects, Calatrava's scheme, featuring a sprawling white structure with ribbed arches and dramatic glass-and steel "wings," was remarkably well received by press and public alike. Among the highlights of the design, which was inspired by an image of a bird taking flight, is a grand vaulted pavilion with cathedral-like arches and a 150-foot-high transparent roof. Floors made of glass blocks will allow natural light to illuminate train station platforms some 60 feet below ground.

Perhaps the most striking feature of the building, echoing that of Calatrava's Milwaukee Art Museum design, is a retractable roof over the 360-foot-tong main concourse that recalls a pair of skeletal birds' wings. Made of two canopies with soaring support beams, the hydraulically operated roof would take about two minutes to create an approximately 50-foot-wide aperture. Plans are to open the roof each year on the morning of Sept. 11. Construction is set to begin late this year with a projected completion date of 2009, coinciding with the inauguration of the neighboring Freedom Tower.

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