What should replace the WTC part 2

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― Ally, Tuesday, 5 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Wouldn't it look kind of like those big lights they shine from strip mall parking lots to attract attention? Actually, those must be illegal now; I haven't seen them in a long time.

― Kris, Tuesday, 5 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I personally feel a little strange about it. What is it supposed to be, a fucking escalator to heaven? Whatever it is, it's going to be a reality this Monday.

I read that weather conditions are a major factor - if it's a very dark, clear night, no one will be able to see them - cause there's nothing for the light to reflect off - but if it's TOO foggy the Federal Aviation Administration's going to tell them to shut them off so planes don't get confused. "Our tribute to the fallen heroes... when the weather's right."

― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, 5 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Yeah, I actually think that's the only fitting one. And it would look just as spectacular as the towers themselves did.

― Momus, Tuesday, 5 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I personally feel a little strange about it. What is it supposed to be, a fucking escalator to heaven?

That's why I like 'em. They look freaky, like, ok, what the hell is that? My question is how you supposed to tell them from the search lights already there?

― Ally, Tuesday, 5 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

They are far more powerful than the work lights they're using at the site. They've contracted with an Italian company for something like 88 "light cannons" and have already done tests out West somewhere. It supposedly works. They won't, of course, be as thick/wide as the towers were, as you can see from the pictures.

― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, 5 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

The only precedent I can think of for this kind of "architecture with lights", by the way, is Albert Speer.

― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, 5 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

i'm telling you, it should be a big grassy park, kids can't play on a fucking spotlight.

― ethan, Tuesday, 5 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Robert Venturi's 1996 book 'Iconography and Electronics' actually discusses this, as did Tom Wolfe in the 1960s with his concept of 'Electrographic Architecture'.

― Momus, Tuesday, 5 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

'Architecture was too late in stylistically acknowledging the industrial revolution,' says Venturi, 'let us acknowledge not too late the technology of now - of video electronics over structural engineering: let us recognize the electronic revolution of the Information Age'.

The (rather good) reader review on Amazon continues: 'A careful observer of popular culture, Venturi includes in his observation also elements like Light Electronic Displays, which are not a real product of digital production but are one of the most explicit representations of an iconography regulated by dots. This, of course, is not contradictory to his idea of a facade as projection surface.'

― Momus, Tuesday, 5 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Anecdote: an architect was commissioned by a Japanese company to make a new corporate headquarters. He flew out to meet the clients, to ask what they wanted. They replied with one word: 'cover'. Confused, the architect said 'Yes, that has been the traditional function of architecture for millenia. To give mankind a cover, protect him from the elements.' 'No,' replied the Japanese client, holding up a magazine, 'we want you to design a building that will be on the cover of every magazine.' (From Blueprint magazine, article on disposability)

― Momus, Tuesday, 5 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Yes yes but these are COLUMNS of LIGHT which are intended to function a sort of tomb-of-the-unknown-soldier. The people who died there were civilians, not soldiers, but the War on Terrorism rhetoric makes them battlefield deaths. All the patriotism and payback that such a memorial implies, and especially the refusal to accept that a Tall Building has collapsed, is what's making me think of Berlin in the 40s.

― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, 5 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I think columns of light that replicate in a ghostly way the shape of the buildings don't evoke Speer, and don't tie in with the Bush rhetoric of 'evil' etc. If you go to West 22nd Street there's an exhibition of proposals, and some have fucking gigantic Stars and Stripes soaring into the sky. Now that *would* be buying into the war- mongering. I'm not aware that any tall buildings were lost in Berlin in the 40s -- I mean, the whole city was flattened, but by then Speer had no chance of winning any reconstruction competitions. And are the searchlights really evoking 'the unknown soldier'? Not for me they're not.

― Momus, Tuesday, 5 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

The probelm -- people should be able to mourn when they want, not everytime they see the skyline.

― Sterling Clover, Tuesday, 5 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

And the poor migrating birds lured off course.

― bnw, Tuesday, 5 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I think the illusion of the buildings seemed really quite subtle and moving, like being in a desrt and finding an oasis only to find it's a mirage. So you're left with the memory of the building and therefore the people who worked (and died) there in a way a solid statue can't.

But then I have the luxury to view it in my head, the practical realisation of it may not be quite so embraced by those who have to live with it.

― Billy Dods, Tuesday, 5 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Well, it's going to be temporary. I suppose it is elegant and all. But why should elegance be important here?

Momus, I was thinking "Tall Building" = moral foundation for economic/social structure, in Germany: Nazism.

― Tracer hand, Tuesday, 5 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

It will take years to build a proper memorial, as nothing can be built on the site itself til the recovery is done. Besides, how can you ask all the victims' families to choose what should be built there? They won't be able to choose.

Still, the lights are pretty great. Says, "Dammit, we're here"....plus it will confuse the pigeons;>

― Nichole Graham, Tuesday, 5 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

i want a giant memorial of dubya and cheney - with lights shining out of thier asses.

― QUeen G, Tuesday, 5 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

"Tron, we're almost there! I can see the MCP, straight ahead!"

― xerxes, Tuesday, 5 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

That land is far too valuable to become a memorial site.

― JM, Wednesday, 6 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Y'all saying that from your own point of view or from the view of the business impulse?

― Ned Raggett, Wednesday, 6 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

(all fall into spiral tracing asymptote of own points of view with axis of business interests)

uh, we may be awhile...

― Tracer Hand, Saturday, 9 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

did anyone see the escalator to heaven last night? it's pretty spectacular. i must admit i expected the beams to start waving around inna movie premiere stylee.

― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, 12 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

one month passes...

are the searchlights really evoking 'the unknown soldier'? Not for me they're not.

if at first you don't succeed... the Daily News reports that "a tomb of unknown victims — holding the unidentified remains of hundreds killed Sept. 11 — is a top contender to become a centerpiece of the permanent memorial at the World Trade Center site. The proposal — reminiscent of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia — has been steadily gaining favor at meetings among victims' relatives, Mayor Bloomberg and the Lower Manhattan Development Corp. officials, family members said yesterday."

― Tracer Hand, Thursday, 18 April 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

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