Around Ground Zero - Close Up at a Distance: Mapping, Technology, and Politics - page 84

The openings afforded by cross streets and avenues often allow VIEWS of the
site. As the demolition progresses, these locations change. There are two official
VIEWING PLATFORMS . Just inside the site at the southwest corner, the Port Author -
ity platform has been used by dignitaries, celebrities, officials, and by the victims'
families, many of whom have written messages on the handrails. A public view -
ing platform has been built on Fulton Street, near Broadway. It too has become a
repository of messages left by visitors. Tickets to the viewing platform are distrib -
uted daily at the South Street Seaport Museum's ticket booth at Fulton and South
Street on Pier 16.
In addition to the collapsed WTC buildings there were some 45 seriously dam -
aged buildings around the site. Many of these have been repaired and reopened.
Some of these structures have been temporarily covered by construction CURTAINS
to prevent injury and damage from falling debris.
Within and around the site, many spontaneous MEMORIALS to the dead and
missing have been constructed, disassembled, lost, removed, moved, or rebuilt
since September 11. At Ground Zero, large pieces of the building, notably the rem -
nants of the walls and fragments of its steel structure, served as markers of the
catastrophe until mid-December. At the fence, the viewings platforms and else -
where, memorials have included candles, photographs, flowers, flags, messages,
and teddy bears, which have become the most prominent symbols of mourning
and memory. Two memorials were created along the Battery Park Esplanade, one
for uniformed officers and the other (a wall of hundreds of teddy bears, now
largely removed) for civilian victims. The fence along St. Paul's Chapel on Broad -
way at Fulton Street has been a constant, if changing, memorial site. An unclaimed
bicycle on Broadway at Cedar Street serves as a memorial to the unknown number
of undocumented immigrant workers who died on September 11. Thousands of fly-
ers with the photographs of the missing, their names and descriptions, were posted
at hospitals, rescue centers, bus stops, and phone booths around the City. They
first appeared as signs of hope, and later became markers of loss and memory.
The “Tribute in Light,” a projection of two beams of light into the night sky
over Battery Park City, is scheduled to run from March 11 through April 13. Another
temporary memorial, composed of the remnants of a destroyed sculpture from the
WTC plaza, is planned for Battery Park.