NYT event listing for Children's Museum, Nov 2003

NYC 9/11 Public Portal Document

West Street, also known as Route 9A, is a multi-lane, 260-foot wide highway serving both regional and local traffic in Lower Manhattan. Its traffic conditions and width -— more than twice as wide as a typical Manhattan avenue — make it a barrier for pedestrians by cutting off Battery Park City, the World Financial Current west street conditions. Center, and the Hudson River waterfront from the rest of Lower Manhattan. Significantly, West Street acts as a divide between the World Trade Center site, the emerging residential community south of Liberty Street, and the existing Battery Park City com­ munity. Residents complain about the safety hazards of crossing West Street, and retailers in the World Financial Center suffer from their lack of accessibility. 7

Since September llth, there has been extensive discussion of the best ways in which to accom­ modate the large traffic volumes that flow along West Street, while also improving the pedestrian experience and making the areas adjacent to West Street more amenable to residential and com­ mercial development. The portion that runs along the length of the World Trade Center site is of special concern since it must provide an appropriately dignified and aesthetically graceful set­ ting for the future World Trade Center memorial. Numerous design concepts have been consid­ ered that attempt to address the dual goals of meeting the needs of the Memorial Garden within the bathtub of the World Trade Center site — an integral component of Studio Danie! Libeskind's site design —- and eliminating West Street as a barrier between Lower Manhattan neighborhoods.

Improving the Pedestrian Experience: The Promenade

The New York State Department of Transportation, working with the LMDC and the Port Authority, has developed a design for West Street that consists of a tree-lined pedestrian prome­ nade from the World Trade Center site to Historic Battery Park. This design will accomplish the goals of creating better east-west pedestrian connections, improving the pedestrian environ­ ment, easing surface congestion, and accommodating the need to create a quiet, respectful site for the memorial. This plan will transform a congested highway into a grand landscaped boulevard — one that will rival such exemplary urban spaces as Barcelona’s Passeig de Gracia, Berlin’s LInter den Linden, or Paris’s Champs Elysees.

1 Manhattan Transport a tioii Strategies

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