When Daniel Libeskind and David Childs hugged in a photo op at Ground Zero last July, the construction industry cheered.

The historic collaboration between Skidmore Owings & Merrill and Studio Daniel Libeskind, meant building Freedom Tower at the World Trade Center site came one step closer to reality.

Early this spring, the Lower Manhattan Development Corp. announced that the winning master plan was Studio David Libeskind. Libeskind’s design combined exposure of the slurry wall in which the original WTC was built, as tribute to the past. Included would be a defiant tower that would rise 1,776 feet in the air, making it not only a patriotic height, but the tallest building in the world.

It was an exciting moment, but soon thereafter, the questions came: How was the massive project to be started? How was the master plan and concept ever to be executed and by whom? Libeskind had never designed a building of this magnitude before. How would buildable construction documents be created? And there was that pesky issue of who would foot the bill.

These questions loomed all spring until mid-summer when Larry Silverstein, whose Silverstein Properties Inc. holds a 99-year lease from the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey on the World Trade Center site, brought Libeskind together with his choice of Skidmore Owings & Merrill’s lead architect, David Childs. Childs is also designer of 7 World Trade Center, another Silverstein-developed property that is already under construction across Vescey Street from Ground Zero.

In a brief ceremony at the site, the Lower Manhattan Development Corp. announced this collaboration that combines form and function -- Libeskind provides the form by collaborating in the conceptual and schematic design phases, and SOM provides the function -- they’ll get it done.

Differences between Libeskind’s concept and Silverstein’s needs as a commercial developer have yet to be resolved.

In particular, Silverstein reportedly wants the 1776 Freedom Tower relocated from the northwestern to the eastern side of the site, closer to the planned new transportation hub and presumably more attractive to tenants.

In addition, Silverstein is reported to believe that Libeskind’s buildings do not provide enough unobstructed, column-free floor space needed to attract Class-A tenants. Childs has apparently come up with an alternative design that places the 1776 Freedom Tower directly over (instead of to the side of) a 70-story office building.

In early July, Silverstein began to push the Lower Manhattan Development Corp., which is overseeing the rebuilding effort, and the Port Authority, to which he has continued to pay $10 million a month in rent since Sept. 11, 2001, for changes in the design.

A meeting between Childs and Libeskind took place on July 16, reportedly brokered by Gov. George Pataki, whose aides monitored the eight-hour negotiations by phone. Pataki has said publicly that he wants the cornerstone for the first office tower in place by summer 2004, which happens to coincide with the Republican National Convention that will be held in New York.

This new schedule announcement put pressure on the team to get the job done and get the job done fast.

At the end of the meeting, Silverstein, Childs and Libeskind issued a joint statement that read, in part:

"We are pleased to announce an historic collaboration between Skidmore, Owings & Merrill and Studio Daniel Libeskind to design the world’s tallest building, the Freedom Tower. SOM, one of the world’s leading skyscraper design firms, will serve as the design architect and project manager, leading a project team that will design the tower.

"Studio Daniel Libeskind, which has been designated by the Port Authority as the master plan architect for the World Trade Center site, will serve as collaborating architect during the concept and schematic design phases of the Freedom Tower and a full member of the Project Team. … We are confident that SOM and SDL will produce a world-class icon in the Lower Manhattan skyline and a powerful symbol of our nation’s resilience in the aftermath of tragedy."

Libeskind is hardly out of the picture. Not only will he work hand in hand with SOM, he has already signed contracts with the LMDC to work on the development of the memorial and the spaces closest to it, including the cultural buildings planned for the site. He also has a contract with the Port Authority to work on the layout of streets and open spaces on the site.

The PA continues to say that he will have a role in the design of the new transportation hub to be built under the site.
The emergence of Silverstein and his handpicked architect at the front of the pack, is hardly surprising. The lease he signed with the Port Authority six weeks before the terrorist attacks gives him the right to rebuild the 10 million sq. ft. of commercial space that was lost.

Beyond that, he is the only one with the money to redevelop the site anytime soon. Depending of the outcome a court case, Silverstein will get between $3.5 billion and $7 billion in insurance payments to rebuild the WTC.

With Pataki’s push on the schedule, and the design team now in place that can produce the necessary drawings, the construction industry should begin gearing up for the fast-track redevelopment really being put on the fast track.