Tribute in Light atop the Battery Garage on Morris Street.
Tribute In Light will shine from Dusk to Dawn to honor all those who lost their lives on September 11, 2001 and to serve as a symbol of hope for the city of New York. An iconic gesture of remembrance is officially deemed a public artwork installation supported by Governor Cuomo, Mayor Bloomberg, the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, Battery park City Authority, The Municipal Art Society, and all the public, corporate, and private sponsors.
According to the Tribute in Light website:
“Conceived in the aftermath of the September 11th tragedies, Tribute in Light is a temporary artistic gesture bringing together the vision and talent of numerous individuals who, shortly after the attacks, independently envisioned two beams of light rising from downtown New York. Finding support for their ideas, they joined forces in the spirit of the rescue and recovery effort downtown. The creative team consists of architects John Bennett and Gustavo Bonevardi of PROUN Space Studio, artists Julian LaVerdiere and Paul Myoda, architect Richard Nash Gould, and lighting designer Paul Marantz. Production support was provided by two non-profit cultural institutions The Municipal Art Society and Creative Time, with the assistance of Battery Park City Authority.”
When not in use, the entire installation is stored within the Battery Park City Garage until their annual commemorative use.
The blue beams, which are reported to be visible for 60 miles, are comprised of 88 separate 7,000-watt searchlights, which are powered by a gas-run generator housed in a tractor trailer just outside of the parking garage.
Although internationally renowned as a symbol of the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center, The New York City Audubon Society notes warnings on their deadly effects on migrating birds. This year, the Municipal Society has promised to monitor the art installation for this concern and will shut off the lights to mitigate the danger the beams cause to the migratory patterns.
Our neighborhood is on virtual lockdown and our defenses are up due to the heightened terror alert. That didn’t stop a disconcerting dissonance from erupting on New York Harbor.
At 9am this morning, loud roaring noises could be heard at virtually every point of Battery Park City — with most residents not having any forewarning to the commotion.
Apparently Super Boat International want to disrupt any sense of calm and safety before the anniversary of 9/11 by holding the 21st Annual New York Super Boat Grand Prix right outside our windows. For those of you who are not right on the water’s edge, it sounds like you’re on the sidelines of an Indy 500 racetrack.
Ostensibly, the event is being held to commemorate 9/11. The race gives off-duty Coasties a chance to race around New York Harbor with gross indifference to the thousands of those who live in our area.
According to the press release, “Boats will start arriving Thursday September 8th to Liberty Landing Marina in Liberty State Park in New Jersey. Fans can see their favorite boats up close Thursday September 8th and Friday September 9th. There will be one race on Saturday morning starting at 9:00 am. Race teams are scheduled to race 17 and 3/4 laps totaling 84 miles on a rectangular course just under 5 miles around. Fans can watch from both the New York and New Jersey shorelines.”
Pedestrian and traffic changes during week of 9/11 anniversary.
The City is preparing for the annual September 11th commemoration ceremony at the National September 11 Memorial at the World Trade Center site. At this time, we would like to share with you detailed information regarding the upcoming ceremony, including street closures, traffic, parking and pedestrian impacts.
The commemoration for family members will take place on Sunday, September 11th from 6:30 AM until 4:00 PM. Following a moment of silence at 8:46 AM, the names of the victims will be read with music as a backdrop throughout the program. Additionally there will be a total of five moments of silence: 9:03 AM, 9:36 AM (Pentagon), 9:59 AM, 10:03 AM (Flight 93), and 10:28 AM. During the ceremony, families will be allowed to visit the 9/11 Memorial for the first time. The Tribute in Light will begin at sundown.
Given the limited vehicle and pedestrian access in the immediate area of the World Trade Center site and Lower Manhattan vicinity on September 11th, we encourage you and your fellow residents, tenants, employees and outside guests to do the following in preparation:
Avoid scheduling deliveries on Sunday, September 11th until after 8:00 PM.
Residents and employees should carry verification of home or business address at all times.
Minimize car service pickups on September 11th. Traffic along Broadway is expected to be heavy.
Use public transportation whenever possible to stations outside of the event area. Please note:
MTA passengers should plan for the Cortlandt Street R station to be bypassed from 7:00 AMto early afternoon and check the MTA website at www.mta.info for updates on bus routes and service.
PATH passengers should plan for suspended service to and from the World Trade Center and restricted access to the WTC Path Station from approximately 7:00 AM to 11:00 AM.
Please note below significant routes that will affect your vehicular travels:
Northbound West Street between Battery Place and Murray Streets will be closed to traffic from Friday, September 9, 11:59 PM through Monday, September 12, 5:00 AM.
Southbound West Street between Battery Place and Chambers Street will be closed to traffic from Sunday, September 11, 5:00 AM through Monday, September 12, 5:00
Church Street/Trinity Place between Rector and Barclay Streets will be closed Sunday, September 11, 5:00 a.m. through 5:00 p.m.
The following streets will be closed to traffic and parking from Saturday, September 10 at 8:00 AM through Sunday, September 11, 8:00 PM. Pedestrian access will be very limited:
Warren Street between West Street and West Broadway
Murray Street between West and Church Streets
Barclay Street between West and Church Streets
Park Place between Greenwich Street and Broadway
Greenwich Street between Warren and Vesey Streets
West Broadway between Warren and Vesey Streets
Vesey Street between North End Avenue and West Street
Vesey, Fulton, Dey and Cortlandt Streets between Church Street and Broadway
Liberty Street between South End Avenue and West Street, and between Greenwich Street and Broadway
Albany Street between South End Avenue and Greenwich Street
Cedar Street between Greenwich Street and Broadway
Thames Street between Greenwich and Broadway
Carlisle Street between West and Greenwich Streets
South End Avenue between Liberty and Thames Street
Washington Street between Albany and Rector Streets
Greenwich Street between Liberty and Rector Streets
Please note, both the Vesey Street and Liberty Street pedestrian bridges will be closed on Sunday, September 11th. To cross West Street, pedestrians will be directed north to cross at Warren Street or south to cross at Rector Street.
No parking will be in effect on all closed streets, including official permit parking. All cars parked illegally will be towed. If you have further questions, please call 311 or visit www.nyc.gov.
Asphalt Green’s, the iconic Upper East Side community center is set to open the doors to its Lower West Side location – right here in Battery Park City. To prepare for its long awaited opening, the facility is offering neighborhood residents special charter membership rates in the brand new 52,000 square foot facility. Although the exact costs of charter membership are not well publicized, residents are encouraged to take advantage of the limited time only charter membership costs.
Membership includes:
•   Access to fitness center and member lap swim
•   Open recreation hours in pool and gymnasium
•   Preferred rates and priority registration on fee-based programs
•   Complimentary group and water exercise classes
•   Steam room
•   Full service locker rooms
•   Drop-in babysitting services
A far cry from our beloved and quickly shuttered New York Sports Club. Some other of the facility features include:
•   25-yard lap pool
•   Warm water teaching and exercise pool
•   Cardio and strength equipment
•   Gymnasium equipped for basketball, indoor soccer, and other sports
•   6 multi-purpose studios and classrooms
•   Culinary center
•   156-seat theater for lectures, film screenings and other activities
Yup, you read that second to last bullet right – the Asphalt Green facilities brings a Culinary Arts center in which family friendly classes will be offered to establish healthy eating habits along with all the healthy fitness activities the neighborhood will be partaking in. Cultural Arts will also be a core programming offering in collaboration with the Battery Park City Parks Conservancy. Cultural Arts classes will be held which include art, music, dance, science, nature and other family friendly activities.
'The End of Manhattan,' exhibits the work of Jay Fine
Jay Fine, BatteryParkCity.com’s favorite and often featured photographer, is showcasing his Fine photography in an exhibit entitled, “The End of Manhattan.”
With Lower Manhattan as his muse, Jay Fine will be exhibiting his work which includes his iconic shot of the Statue of Liberty struck by lightning, an image that had received critical praise in media outlets internationally.
Along with Antonio Petracca’s “10”, Fine’s “The End of Manhattan” opens at the Kim Foster Gallery on September 8th from 6pm-8pm. Both exhibits will be displayed through October 15th.
Antonio Petracca’s new exhibition “10” is a journey that started with 9/11. Petracca a Battery Park City resident, who was displaced and living in a hotel, felt compelled to begin a new series of paintings that responded to the tragedy of 9/11. The mission of Petracca’s exhibit is to depict the destruction, the sense of great loss and, more importantly, the can-do spirit of rebuilding and renewal that most New Yorkers felt at the time.
On the flip side, Jay Fine’s exhibit “The End of Manhattan” might have a dire name, but is more meditative view on the photographer’s life in Battery Park City than a 9/11 commemoration. Included in the show is 60×40 inch version of the aforementioned Statue of Liberty and Lightning photo, which was more recently featured in the August 2011 National Geographic Magazine.
According to Fine, “The exhibits compliment each other and should generate, we hope, a lot of interest, not just from the people who liver here but from folks around the world. Some of the greatest responses to my work are from France, Italy and South East Asia based on the feedback from my Facebook page and Flickr site.”
The exhibit itself is pegged to be a Downtown family affair, Â with the framing of the prints done by Battery Park City residents and owners of the World Trade Art Gallery, Jane and Doug Smith. The large scale prints were made by Joseph Ng, whose wife works in the Financial District.
The Kim Foster Gallery is located at 529 W 20th Street, New York.
For more information please check the gallery’s website: www.kimfostergallery.com/
9/10/10 Downtown 7:47 PM Thursday (Credit: Jay Fine)Tunnel to Towers by Jay Fine
The September 11th Anniversary Rituals (Credit: Cleveland.com)
As we embark on nearly a decade since the September 11th attacks, an interesting media conundrum has arisen. How can media outlets honor and cover the tragedy without exploiting the victims and those affected by the tragedy?
Nearly every major network television as well as large cable outlets have dedicated programming around the 9/11 events, including exclusive interviews, footage and documentaries from survivors and politicians alike. The moral dilemma on whether or not to sell advertising around the content is a conundrum that has no moral precedence in modern media culture.
According to a compelling article published by the New York Times today, Jeremy W. Peters and Brian Stelter write,
“There are no uniform answers, and media outlets are approaching it differently. Time magazine is running no ads at all. Newsweek and People have sold ads just as they would for any other issue. Cable channels, which are devoting big blocks of their schedules to Sept. 11-related programming, are also largely running commercials as usual. But there exceptions; CNN, for example, is to show a joint HBO-Time special commercial free. In its regular Sunday edition on Sept. 11, The New York Times is publishing a special section that will contain only commemorative ads.”
It becomes a slippery slope on how to cover 9/11. As years pass, the issue will undoubtedly come up again. How do you feel about this?
Battery Park City Landfill (Credit: Flickr - StevenSiegel260)
There is a certain poeticism when you think about the ground that Battery Park City is built on. Nearly four decades ago – Battery Park City was merely a concept born from the construction of the World Trade Center. Troublesome to remove landfill from the World Trade Center was more of a nuisance than a deliberate urban plan. Either way, the gaping holes from the World Trade Center site  gave rise to an urban planning precedence of a self encompassed city development. It is also poignant to note hat a city born to live within the shadows and the rise of the Twin Towers will forever live in the shadows of those same buildings tragedy.
Past, present and future aside – Nearly forty years later, the vision of Battery Park City is complete, and a final milestone in our community is overshadowed by the 10 year anniversary of September 11th.
The last two parcels of land, now have a name – Liberty Luxe and Liberty Green. The final twin-like installations of residential complexes have finished construction and will officially round out our population to nearly 13,000 in Battery Park City limits proper.
According to the Architectural Record, who has noted this small milestone, “After weathering several recessions, leadership changes, and September 11, BPC now covers roughly two dozen city blocks and contains more than 13,000 residents, 9 million square feet of commercial space, and several civic and cultural venues. “The buildings have a much more interesting program than we planned,†Eckstut says, citing Stuyvesant High School (Cooper, Robertson & Partners, 1992) and the Museum of Jewish Heritage (Kevin Roche John Dinkeloo and Associates, 1997). “These departures have made it more of a real city.â€
BPC’s showpiece is the 1.5-mile-long waterfront esplanade, which features a plaza, marina, and views of the Statue of Liberty. Another vital community amenity: the Cesar Pelli–designed Winter Garden (1988), where free public events are presented year-round.
BPC’s success is attributable to its sustainable aspects. A dozen projects have received or are expected to receive LEED certification, but as Cooper notes, the neighborhood’s most important “green†features — open space, density, and proximity to transit — prefigured the sustainability discourse by decades.
Officially, Battery Park City’s official 30th birthday is still up in the air.  For those who consider the 1982 Battery Park City’s birthday when it opened its doors to commercial businesses, Battery Park City’s anniversary will be next year. However, if you consider the first residential move-ins as the mark of the  neighborhood, then 2015 is your celebratory year.
A far cry from the beachfront property that Lower Manhattan seemed to enjoy that hardly resemble the city we know and love now.
12:05 p.m.:Trinity Church offers a homily, congregational singing and organ music along with prayers for healing (Trinity Church, Lower Manhattan)

12:30 p.m.:St. Paul’s Chapel offers daily prayers for peace which date back to the relief ministry following 9/11 (St. Paul’s Chapel, Lower Manhattan)
TUESDAY 9/6/11
 

8 a.m.: Mayor Michael Bloomberg delivers address on rebirth of Lower Manhattan since 9/11 [LIVE ON NY1]
10 a.m.: Trinity Wall Street holds public art event, including the tying of the first “Ribbons of Remembrance” onto St. Paul’s fence. (St. Paul’s Chapel. Lower Manhattan)
1 p.m: Interactive art installation and live performances celebrating 9/11 volunteerism and featuring short film on 9/11 community (Irondale Center, Ft. Greene, Brooklyn)
7:30 p.m .: National September 11 Memorial and Museum and Soulcycle co-host a tribute ride to commemorate the 9/11 tenth anniversary (103 Warren Street, Manhattan)

WEDNESDAY 9/7/11
 

10:15 a.m.: WTC developer Larry Silverstein hosts WTC rebuilding update including presentations by Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver
THURSDAY 9/8/11

8 a.m.: Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver delivers address on resilience and growth of Lower Manhattan over last decade
8:30 a.m.: Natural Centers for Disaster Preparedness holds public health conference looks at the next ten years (Columbia University. Manhattan)
9 a.m.: Police Commissioner Ray Kelly holds ceremony to honor NYPD families who were victims of 9/11
7:30 p.m.: Port Authority and United Community Civic Association hold 9/11 memorial candlelight vigil at McManus Memorial Park (81st Street and Grand Central Service Road, Qneens)
7:30 p.m.: The Public Theater Explores “The 9/11 Decade: New York and America After the Towers,” hosted by Alec Baldwin with a discussion to follow
7:30 p.m: Performance of Richard Nelson’s “Sweet and Sad” (425 Lafayette Street, Manhattan)
8 p.m.: 9/11 conference on “A Decade Later: Lessons Learned and Future Challenges” (Kaufmann Concert Hall, Lexington Avenue at 92nd Street, Manhattan)

FRIDAY 9/9/11
 

8:30 a.m.: Unified Court Systems Officials hold 9/11 memorial mass
9:30 a.m – Court Officers holds salute for the three court officers who died on 9/11
3:30 p.m.: Manhattan College holds “We Remember” service to commemorate 9/11 attacks, featuring former mayor Rudolph Giuliani (Riverdale, Bronx)
4 p.m.: Young People’s Chorus of NY gives free performances to commemorate 9/11 tenth anniversary (St. Paul’s, Manhattan)
4 p.m.: Broadway community holds tribute to mark the 9/11 tenth anniversary (Times Square)
5 p.m.: Young People’s Chorus of NY gives free performances to commemorate 9/11 tenth anniversary (Columbus Circle, Manhattan)
5:30 p.m.: Peace of Heart Choir sings at 9/11 anniversary event (Central Park South and West 59th Street, Manhattan)
6 p.m.: Imam Feisal Rauf hosts Muslim event honoring years of interfaith work to recognize various groups and individuals since 9/11 (Interchurch Center, 475 Riverside Drive, Manhattan)
8 p.m.: Stephen Siller Tunnel to Towers Foundation holds “A Tribute to Our Heroes” fundraising concert (St. George Theater, Staten Island)
8:30 p.m.: Young People’s Chorus of NY gives free performances to commemorate 9/11 tenth anniversary (Trinity Church, Manhattan)
SATURDAY 9/10/11
 

8:46 a.m.: Hand in Hand/Remembering 9/11 event along Manhattan’s West Side waterfront (Greenwich Street and Battery Place, Manhattan)
1 p.m.: National Lighthouse Museum hosts multimedia exhibit commemorating the 9/11 tenth anniversary (Staten Island)
1 p.m.: Peace of Heart choir sings at 9/11 anniversary event (278 Spring Street, Manhattan)
2 p.m.: FDNY holds 9/11 memorial service at for firefighters and their families (St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Manhattan)
3:30 p.m.: Trinity Church holds reunion BBQ for 9/11 first responders, recovery workers and volunteers (St. Paul’s Chapel, Lower Manhattan)
6 p.m.: St. Paul’s Chapel remains open for all-night vigil, prayer, meditation and labyrinth (St. Paul’s Chapel, Lower Manhattan)
7:30 p.m.: Lincoln Center holds concert for 9/11 (Lincoln Center, Manhattan)
