WTC site

A couple of days ago I posted a small set of photos of the impromptu memorials that had sprung up around the World Trade Center site one year after the attacks.

For those wondering what the site is like today and how progress is going on the construction of the new complex, the best place to turn is always the New York Times. Today they have a good article summarizing the current state of affairs.

Below Ground Zero, Stirrings of Past and Future

[…]
For now, there is nowhere else at ground zero where time is more palpably suspended than in the tubes and tunnels and truck bays that once served the World Trade Center and, before that, the Hudson & Manhattan Railroad, predecessor to PATH.

Almost four years after the attack, signs still command truck drivers who have long since vanished: “No Idling.” “Not for Service Vehicles.” “30 Minute Parking Only for Deliveries. Offenders Will Be Autoclamped and Fined.”

Within the cavernous gloom of the deeply ribbed 15-foot-3-inch-diameter tubes, the quiet is broken every few minutes by the disembodied rumble of a PATH train passing nearby.
[…]
Mr. Ringler said elements of this subterranean realm – perhaps some cast-iron tube rings, certainly some ornamental flooring – would be salvaged.

The authority is committed to preserving the travertine-clad hallway leading to the E train terminus at Chambers Street. It plans to relocate the cruciform steel column that was found at 6 World Trade Center. What the authority does not save, it will document in written descriptions, drawings and large-format photographs.

“It’s important that we attempt to preserve some of this for history,” Mr. Ringler said. “This is part of the story. It is not necessarily integral to 9/11, but there is history here.”