NEW YORK (AP) – Mayor Michael Bloomberg laid out a second-term wish list in his Thursday State of the City address, one of his most ambitious speeches now that the former businessman is buoyed by four years of political experience.

“After starting this decade at the peak of an economic boom, we soon tumbled into the darkest of valleys, and since then, against all the odds, our city has climbed back up that mountain faster than anyone thought possible,” Bloomberg said after entering the Snug Harbor Cultural Center music hall in Staten Island to rousing applause.

The mayor’s big dreams include new ways to crack down on guns and a detailed plan for rebuilding the World Trade Center site, a senior administration official said earlier.

The Bloomberg administration had been tight-lipped on details ahead of the speech, but Boston Mayor Thomas Menino said Wednesday in Washington that the anti-gun campaign would take the form of a national coalition that he and Bloomberg would co-chair together.

Bloomberg has spoken out harshly against gun violence in recent weeks after the shooting deaths of two New York City police officers.

When the billionaire Republican mayor first arrived at City Hall four years ago, he had just left his financial information company, Bloomberg L.P., and was untested in politics. His first State of the City address came just months after the Sept. 11 trade center attack.

The following year, with dismal poll numbers and a tanking economy, he was reserved in his speech, warning about the belt-tightening moves the city would have to make to pull through. In 2004, most of the buzz about his address focused on a proposal that gave homeowners $400 tax refunds.

And last year, suddenly facing a re-election campaign, Bloomberg’s address showed all the signs of a political stump speech. He boasted about the progress he believed he had made in his first term, such as overcoming budget deficits and tackling education reform.

The mayor was re-elected last November, steamrolling his Democratic opponent after spending $85 million of his own cash on his campaign. In arranging his second-term administration, Bloomberg has built his inner circle more with trusted confidants than bureaucrats because he feels more comfortable in the job.

“When I came into office, I knew something about management, but I didn’t know the intricate details of how every agency works and so I went out and got some phenomenally competent people that had the experience,” Bloomberg said recently. “Here we are four years later, and they’ve chosen to go off and, you know, I’m more familiar with each of the agencies and I’ve split up the responsibilities in a different ways.”

His familiarity with governing translates to a more emboldened pursuit of his second-term goals. He also is essentially free from any political constraints: Term limit law prohibits him from running for mayor again, and he has repeatedly insisted he has no aspirations for higher office.

Last fall Bloomberg began to signal that he would like more control over the trade center site, which has largely been commanded by Republican Gov. George Pataki. On Thursday he was to propose a faster track for redeveloping the scarred swath of Lower Manhattan, which he says should have multiple projects going simultaneously rather than one by one.

He delivered the address on Staten Island, completing a five-borough State of the City tour. Each year he has given the speech in a different borough.