Build 9/11 memorial now

Inter Lake editorial

Today is the eighth anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, and shamefully, rebuilding Ground Zero in New York City remains a work in progress - very slow progress.

The grand plan for developing the former site of the two World Trade Center towers involves five skyscrapers set in a spiral, surrounding a large memorial in a park, a transportation hub and a theater. But for now it is just a vacant monument to what hasn't been done or may never get done.

While some parts of the project have started, other parts have been mired by engineering and financing complications and the pressures of a recession that has slowed demand for commercial office space in the city.

But the general outlook for the grand design is that it will take decades to finish. What's worse is that even the centerpiece memorial, a first skyscraper called the Freedom Tower and the transportation hub won't be finished until sometime between 2011 and 2014.

"At the center of the desire to do this is really [the hope] to create an inspiring place …. an affirmation of American values," said Daniel Libeskind, the man who created the master design that was chosen by city officials in 2003.

The problem is that it actually may represent the confusion of modern-day American values. The only thing missing in the delays at Ground Zero is that environmental lawsuits haven't been filed to block the project … yet.

It certainly does not represent the "can-do" spirit of the country's past. Consider that the current tallest building in New York City, the Empire State Building, was finished in 1931 after just 410 days of construction, or that the U.S. put a man on the moon in less than a decade, or that Hoover Dam was finished in 1936 after five years of construction, becoming the world's largest concrete structure at the time.

There have been many other remarkable achievements, but the effort to rebuild at the site of the worst domestic attack in the country's history is not one of them.

Let's hope that someone emerges to exert some leadership on this project and get it done.