On December 18, 2002, the eyes of the world watched television as some of the world’s great architects presented schemes for rebuilding the World Trade Center. The next day newspaper front pages from Calcutta to Casablanca displayed these designs. The Lower Manhattan Development Corporation opened an exhibition of drawings and models at the Winter Garden in Battery Park City. In the first two weeks following the press conference, the LMDC Web site had 2 million unique visitors. It was the first time in history that architecture became the focus of so much popular attention and discussion.

As vice president of the LMDC, I played a major role in shaping many of these events. Several recent books have made me think about the reasons architecture became a subject of intense public interest. Even before the destruction of the World Trade Center, the increasing role of community participation in decision-making had begun to produce architecture better geared to the realities of politics and the demands of citizens. As the rebuilding process unfolded the public demonstrated its unwillingness to permit something mediocre on the site. Designs for the projects that follow will have to match or surpass the standard set by the World Trade Center.

In “Up from Zero,” NewYorker architecture critic and dean of Parsons School of Design Paul Goldberger explained what happened in the reconstruction of the site from September 12 to the summer of 2004. In “Ground – Adventures in Life and Architecture,” winning architect Daniel Libeskind presented his side of the story, along with moving accounts of his family history. And in the new volume “Imagining Ground Zero,” Suzanne Stephens has provided a unique catalog in pictures of the many official and unofficial designs for the World Trade Center. Each is a must-read for anyone interested in what has been one of the most important events in the history of architecture – an event that nearly did not happen.

The owner of the site, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, was not interested in great architecture: It was interested in rebuilding as rapidly as possible so it could ensure the continuing revenue stream needed to pay debt service on bonds that had been issued for its various projects. The Silverstein Organization, to whom the Port Authority had leased the site for 99 years, needed to replace the buildings, whose rent-paying tenants allowed it to make payments to lenders and investors.

On the other side, the families of the people murdered on September 11 – as well as many, many others – considered the site to be hallowed ground. A large number opposed building anything. Others demanded a suitable memorial. Residents and workers of Lower Manhattan, on the other hand, wanted daily life in the area restored to normal. New Yorkers wanted the subway lines back in operation. Commuters wanted the PATH trains and West Street in operation. In other words, design and architecture were not a primary concern.

And, indeed, the true heroes of this story are not the glamorous designers: They are the diligent staffs of NYC’s Department of Emergency Services, Con Edison, Verizon, the Port Authority, the MTA, the New York State Department of Transportation, and all the government agencies that had Lower Manhattan almost back to normal in a matter of months. While they were doing their job, Mayor Giuliani and Governor Pataki created the LMDC to manage the rebuilding process. John Whitehead, chairman of the board of the LMDC, and Lou Tomson, its president, hired me to be in charge of planning, design, and development.

While I cared very deeply about the architecture of a rebuilt World Trade Center, I did not think there would be widespread public interest in the design of the new buildings and I never imagined the furor that would follow the release of any designs. It was because of the importance I placed on design that the LMDC began by trying to better understand what was involved in creating a new World Trade Center. Consequently, it hired the firm of Peterson and Littenberg, architects and urban designers, to present the design issues of any rebuilding. Starting in April 2002, the firm produced a series of models, drawings, and maps, examining a range of alternatives including orthogonal grids, diagonal grids, and large blocks with and without structures.

The Port Authority had made clear that, whatever we recommended, it would have to meet certain requirements. The PA conceived of the development primarily in terms of transportation planning. The new plan had to accommodate the PATH train system (which the PA had already begun rebuilding) and the underground concourses that connected PATH with the rest of Lower Manhattan, as well as replace 16 million square feet of stores, offices, hotel rooms, parking, and truck docks. The LMDC and the PA jointly hired Beyer Blinder Belle and Parsons Brinckerhoff to prepare alternative reconstruction schemes, which were released to the public on July 16.

Most people were deeply disappointed by these concept plans, despite the fact that both agencies explained that these six schemes were “concept plans” intended to “illustrate ideas for land use, infrastructure planning and building massing … not architectural designs for proposed buildings.” But the following Saturday, a remarkable thing occurred: 4,300 people spent the day at the Jacob Javits Convention Center, discussing the proposals.

Never before had so many people participated in a discussion of planning, urban design, or downtown redevelopment. And there was general agreement on the need for something better. People wanted their skyline back. They wanted a street grid (rather than a 16-acre superblock) and open spaces of different sizes (rather than one large, windswept plaza). They wanted a suitable memorial. And they wanted the redevelopment plan to treat the footprints of the Twin Towers with respect.

One reason for disappointment with the six concept plans was the PA’s insistence on a presentation that eliminated any semblance of architectural character. But it turns out this was fortunate: Had the plans not been disappointing or public reaction as negative, architectural design would never have become a major factor in rebuilding the World Trade Center.

AN INNOVATIVE DESIGN PROCESS

Board members Roland Betts and Billie Tsien eventually convinced the leadership of the LMDC that the way to obtain better results was to open the process to the world’s most imaginative designers. Its Request for Qualifications (RFC) sought designers whose work demonstrated “risk-taking and inspiration” in order to produce “innovative designs. More than 400 teams of designers made submissions, and seven were selected to participate in the innovative design process.

There is still a great deal of confusion about this process. The first thing to realize is that it was a process, not a competition. On the first page the RFQ announced in bold type: “This is NOT a design competition and will not result in the selection of a final plan. It is intended to generate creative and varied concepts to help plan the future of the site.” In October, we gave the participants a thick packet of materials with which to work. In that packet we provided a program, a problem, and a context.

Thereafter, every two weeks for six weeks the staff of the LMDC and the Port Authority met individually with each design team. Each informal session lasted about two hours. The team presented its ideas and, as its proposals crystallized, a range of possible designs. It asked questions of the LMDC and Port Authority staff, which was often able to provide technical support and invariably had questions and reactions of their own.

Despite all this collegial interaction among the designers, the LMDC, and the Port Authority, the press (and consequently the public) thought LMDC wanted winners and losers, rather than ideas from “the most talented and creative designers to aid in envisioning the future of the World Trade Center site.” On December 18, the LMDC opened an exhibit at the World Financial Center, at which the teams presented their designs. During the six weeks following, the LMDC and the Port Authority began a process of analysis: cost estimates as well as marketing, engineering, transportation, and environmental studies. But the excitement over “the competition” only intensified when Studio Libeskind and Think (a team including Rafael Vinoly, Frederic Schwartz, Shigeru Ban, and Ken Smith) were declared the finalists.

The LMDC and the Port Authority spent hours working with these designers to solve problems and increase their proposals’ suitability as development schemes. Again, the press ignored this hard and valuable work, concentrating instead on the politics of the decision-making process. This unnecessarily turned the process into a horse race, but it did intensify public interest to a fever pitch.

GATHERING PUBLIC INTEREST

Interest in architectural design did not begin with the reconstruction plans for the World Trade Center. It had been increasing long before September 11. The opening of the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain, and the Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles conferred stardom on Frank Gehry. But up to that time few, if any, architects attained such notoriety – in 20th-century America, only Frank Lloyd Wright achieved the popular recognition typical of sports or movie stars.

If the destruction of the World Trade Center was a watershed in American politics and international relations, it was no less a watershed in architectural design. Since Studio Libeskind was designated the master planner for the World Trade Center site, the selection of architects for significant projects has gone from being the talk of architectural enthusiasts to major news. The selection of Santiago Calatrava to design the new railroad station, Michael Arad and Peter Walker to design the memorial, and Gehry Partners LLP and Snohetta to design the cultural buildings have all been major news items. The controversy between Daniel Libeskind and David Childs over the shape of the Freedom Tower was in the spotlight for months.

Growing public interest in architecture is as much a product of increasing public participation in government as it is a product of the press’s insatiable search for stars and controversies. Public and nonprofit agencies used to make design decisions – often excellent design decisions – behind closed doors. But too often in the past design decisions have been the product of backroom deals. In the case of the World Trade Center site, the press has accomplished something that I would not have thought possible: It opened the design process to public scrutiny. When the six plans were released in July of 2002, and again when the nine designs were displayed in December, the public made sure that inappropriate schemes were discarded.

Since the selection of a master plan for the World Trade Center, the design of other large projects have been subjected to public scrutiny. The plan for a new park along the Highline on the West Side emerged out of a similar competitive process that included a public exhibition of alternatives designs. NYC2012 – for whom I am managing director for planning – patterned its selection of a design for the Olympic Village on the LMDC’s innovative design process. These examples of public participation in the design of large public projects are changing both the public’s expectations and improving the quality of the projects themselves.

Increasing transparency reduces the likelihood of poor decisions. But it does not guarantee masterworks. Great buildings, whether St. Peters in Rome or the Chrysler Building in New York, are the product of the interaction between great architects, clients determined to create great architecture, and a culture that values and demands a minimum level of quality. Still, as participants in an open society, we should welcome this new interest in architectural design: It will help us to overcome the pervasive mediocrity of the built environment, and it is already raising the quality of design of buildings not as high profile as those discussed here – the sort of buildings that make up most of the landscape.

The rebuilding of the World Trade Center already is a watershed in American architecture, because it has shown us the impressive public demand for quality design. I hope the architectural profession will respond by supplying excellent design, and that their creations will in turn provoke their clients to demand buildings that reflect this change.

Mr. Garvin is managing director for planning with NYC2012 and a professor of architecture at Yale.