Public Speaks on Rebuilding Impacts

 by Barry Owen

In lengthy detail, the Draft Generic Environmental Impact Statement (EIS)-a 2,000-page document released in January by the Lower Manhattan Development Corp.-outlines the changes Downtown residents and workers can expect in air quality, noise, traffic congestion and even sunlight levels during and after the years of construction at the World Trade Center site.
John Ferrick, left, and Andrew Winters, moderators of a Lower Manhattan Development Corp. hearing last month at Pace University, listen to architect Jordan Gruzan critique the draft environmental impact statement. Photo: Carl Glassman

What the report does not address, its critics say, is reality. And last month, at two public hearings on the study, they had their chance to say so.


"It looks harder at the trees than it does at the forest," Mike Edelstein, a professor of environmental psychology at Ramapo College in New Jersey, said of the document. "The community sort of fades into the background in a lot of the analysis."

Edelstein was one of nearly 100 people who spoke at the Feb. 18 hearings at Pace University.

Critics claimed that the report included a litany of faulty assumptions and incorrect conclusions-for example, that most construction workers will use public transportation, that tourist won't come in significantly greater numbers and that "open space" on a sidewalk is equivalent to a park.
And they said it does not take into account the cumulative impact on local residents who over the next decade will not only see the world's tallest building rise in their neighborhood, but will endure the construction of a new subway hub at Fulton Street and Broadway, the demolition of the Deutsche Bank building on Liberty Street and the reconstruction of West Street, possibly with a tunnel. The impacts of each of those projects, expected to be undertaken within the next five years, will be analyzed by separate studies.

"To address a 2,000-page document in three minutes, we all know is an impossibility," said Councilman Alan Gerson, referring to the hearing's time limit for each speaker.
Gerson called the document a "good start" but recommended a more detailed study of how expected traffic congestion would affect emergency services and a broader analysis of how the community would be affected by years of heavy truck traffic.

"Overall, I would have to give it a grade of 'N,' for not complete," he said.
Some saw the hearing as an opportunity to air grievances about the site plans, including the tower and memorial designs.

"It looks like Albany," one woman said, drawing laughter from the audience.
Diane Dreyfus, who identified herself as an urban planner, claimed that the open space assessments in the EIS were inaccurate.

"What I found was that you're going to be getting about 60 percent less of the open space you had prior to the World Trade disaster," she said. "The things that are called parks in the World Trade Center plan are merely sidewalks with fancy names."

Marcie Kesner, representing New York New Visions, a consortium of 21 architectural, planning and engineering organizations that is serving as a consultant on the rebuilding, said the study failed to address the effect of adding a million square feet of retail space to an already depressed market. While all of that retail is projected to be built by 2009, she said, only about one-fourth of the planned office space will be completed by then.

"The spurt of retail space supply would not, for a good period of time, have the support of the purchasing power of workers in the 7.4 million square feet of office to be built post-2009," she said.

George Thurston, associate professor of environmental medicine at New York University School of Medicine, who has studied the health effects of airborne dust and chemicals after the disaster, said the EIS falls short in projecting air pollution levels in the densely populated neighborhood. He called for permanent air monitoring stations in Lower Manhattan.

"The population around the World Trade Center is an especially susceptible population," Thurston said. "You need to document more of what you've done and what you're assuming in terms of the dust."

The assumptions made by the report, particularly those regarding traffic and air quality, have been a sticking point for many people.

During what was supposed to be a "brief" review of the draft's highlights with Community Board 1's WTC Redevelopment Committee earlier last month, project planners from the LMDC were beset by questions and challenges regarding those assumptions. The meeting lasted an hour and a half.

"You're using standard assumptions, but this is a unique neighborhood," committee member Liz Berger said. Berger took issue with the report's projection of only a five percent increase in peak-hour vehicle traffic in the neighborhood after projects are complete in 2009.

In a lengthy resolution approved last month, the community board said it wanted the final environmental statement to outline "all potential effects" of the rebuilding effort, "both on an individual basis and in the context of other concurrent projects." The board called for the establishment of a Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center, to include representatives of the Buildings Department, CB1 and residents and business people close to the site. The command center would coordinate the various construction projects and minimize noise and traffic congestion.

Edelstein, whose students were studying the effects of the rebuilding effort Downtown, said he would probably give the overall draft a 'C' grade.

But with the "stakes involved," he added, "I might not even give it that high of a mark."