New pictures of The One World Trade Center show its frame stands at 90 storeys high, with 20 more yet to be completed.
The One World Trade Center, also known as Freedom Tower, already towers above the skyscrapers surrounding the site where almost 3,000 tragically lost their lives on September 11, 2001.
Workers had been adding a new floor a week up until last year, but in recent months work has slowed.
The Port Authority’s executive director, Patrick Foye, blamed rainy weather and high winds at the top of the building.
Patrick Foye spoke to reporters following a panel discussion on infrastructure at Fordham University on Monday.
The authority also says it is having trouble finding space for the trailers that move upward with the workers.
New pictures of The One World Trade Center show its frame stands at 90 storeys high, with 20 more yet to be completed
As the tower narrows, there is less space on each floor, and transferring the trailers upward takes more time.
DCM Erectors, the New York-based company that is laying the steel, has also had financial problems, Patrick Foye confirmed Monday.
Patrick Foye said the authority has had to step in and pay some of the company’s bills. Steel deliveries have continued, he said.
“They have made arrangements with their financing sources,” Patrick Foye said. “The thing that’s important to us is they continue to fabricate steel and deliver it, and we continue to install it.”
DCM did not immediately return a telephone call from the Associated Press seeking comment.
Patrick Foye said that One World Trade Center is 60% leased and that the authority is still aiming for a completion date in the fourth quarter of 2013.
The structure will top out at 1,368ft foot height, taller than same size as the old WTC. However, the new building will have a 408ft spire, taking it to 1,776ft.
When will be completed, One World Trade Center will be the tallest building in Manhattan and one of incredible poignancy for New York City.
One World Trade Center reached its 90th floor this week – with just 14 more floors to go until the top. The structure can now be seen from all five boroughs of the city.
Amazing pictures showed how the area has been reborn since the 9/11 attacks more than a decade ago where almost 3,000 people lost their lives in the worst ever terrorist attack on American soil.
Picture captured from the 80th floor of One World Trade Center
One World Trade Center is on track to be completed by 2013 with construction workers approximately finishing a floor a week in downtown Manhattan.
Electrical contractors at the tower agreed to give it a festive feel and wrapped the exterior lamps they use with coloured cellophane in time for Christmas.
Developments can be followed on One World Trade Center’s Twitter feed @WTCProgress. Glass now covers up to the 65th floor and concrete has been added up to the 82nd level. There will be 104 floors in the completed building, making it the tallest in Manhattan.
The site will be a place of reflection and contemplation for many and The National September 11 Memorial And Museum, designed by the winning team of Michael Arad and Peter Walker, was opened for the 10th anniversary of the terrorist attacks.
Picture captured from the 77th floor of One World Trade Center
One World Trade Center, designed by renowned architect David Childs, standing in the north-west corner, is the site’s centrepiece.
The first cornerstone was laid down on July 4, 2004, and as the building rose it was known as Freedom Tower.
One WTC stands in the footsteps of the original twin towers among a small forest of oak trees in an eight-acre plaza. It features two 50ft-deep pools, each containing fountains, along with a museum with exhibitions and artefacts to teach visitors about the events of September 11.
At One WTC, there is almost 3million square feet of office space – half of which had already been leased. There is also an observation deck planned more than 1,241ft above ground, fine-dining restaurants and a sprawling public lobby boasting 50ft ceilings. There will be eventually be six skyscrapers on the site altogether.
[youtube YiuiD9G3t_Q]
The first pictures of the 9/11 Memorial at Ground Zero have been revealed before the 10th anniversary on Sunday.
Ground Zero, the site which people once associated with death, devastation and abject terror has now turned, after 10 years, into a place of peace, tranquillity and sadness.
National 9/11 Memorial: view from the south pool waterfall with Freedom Tower in the background
Starting with Sunday, September 11, 2011, Ground Zero – once a black hole of despair – will become known as the National September 11th Memorial.
On the places where the Twin Towers of the World Trade Centre once stood now lies two granite pools in its footprints with waterfalls cascading 30 feet (about 10 meters) below.
National 9/11 Memorial: view of Ground Zero from Washington Street
The one-acre size pools sprawl out across the World Trade Center plaza – one to signify each fallen tower.
The pools are bordered by bronze panels inscribed by the names of all those who perished at the hands of terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, at the Pentagon, in New York and in Pennsylvania; when night time falls, the panels will be backlit to shine against the void.
400 swamp white trees line the plaza and a small clearing known as the Memorial Glade is set aside for special ceremonies, according to the New York Post.
National 9/11 Memorial: Freedom Tower, One World Trade Centre building
A navy-blue flag adorned with 40 gold stars to represent the passengers and crew members who died on United Airlines Flight 93 billows high above the site.
A white ring encircles around an image of the Twin Towers of the World Trade Centre to form the shape of a pentagon to honour the 184 who perished both at the Pentagon and aboard American Airlines Flight 77.
The Twin Towers, standing in the centre of the flag with the numbers nine and 11 and the words ‘we remember’ represents the thousands who perished on the morning of September 11 when two planes crashed into the buildings.
The 9/11 Memorial’s designer, Michael Arad, was a young, little-known architect whose plan was selected out of 5,200 proposals.
“These two acre-sized voids are like a moment of silence and what we do with that moment of silence depends on us. We just want to make sure everything is done very carefully. We’re building for the ages,” Michael Arad told CBS.
National 9/11 Memorial: North Pool at Ground Zero
Joe Daniels, president of the National 9/11 Memorial told the New York Post:
“We remember the towers standing, the towers falling, the devastation on the pile, the empty pit.
“And to move to a place of grace and beauty is something that the entire country can feel proud of.”
The National Memorial opens to the 9/11 families on Sunday and to the public on Monday. Visitors must reserve visitor passes in advance on the memorial’s Website, 911memorial.org.
[youtube NRazT_8L58o]
