U.N. Rejected Offer for Base At Ground Zero
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
The Bloomberg administration discussed with the United Nations a plan to relocate the world body to ground zero following the attacks on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, but Secretary-General Kofi Annan and other U.N. officials rejected the option as too taxing a commute for the Midtown-based employees.
“The United Nations was offered carte blanche to integrate a new headquarters into the redevelopment of Lower Manhattan, and they rejected the idea because it was too inconvenient for bureaucrats to have to go downtown,” a former member of the United Nations Development Corporation, Leo Kayser, told The New York Sun.
“The real problem [was that] not a single ambassador wanted to move downtown,” a managing principal at Newmark, Scott Panzer, said. Mr. Panzer and Barry Gosin, also of Newmark, first suggested the idea to the United Nations in 2002.
Senator Schumer took up the cause, but he backed off after U.N. officials indicated that the proposal lacked the support of member states.
“I’ve discussed the idea with Kofi Annan, I’ve met with their top operations people, and at a recent meeting at the U.N. about the idea I was told it’s a ‘very, very, very, very long shot,'” Mr. Schumer said during a speech given at the Association for a Better New York in May 2002.”By the fourth ‘very,’ I had a pretty good sense that they didn’t want to do it.”
Mr. Schumer added: “Initially, Mayor Bloomberg, Dan Doctoroff, John Whitehead, Larry Silverstein, Charles Gargano, and many other leaders expressed varying degrees of support for the idea, ranging from strong enthusiasm to significant interest.” Mr. Doctoroff is deputy mayor for economic development, Mr. Whitehead is chairman of the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, Mr. Silverstein is the leaseholder of the World Trade Center site, and Mr. Gargano is chairman of the Empire State Development Corporation.
After the United Nations rejected the plan, Mr. Kayser recalled, “They told us to keep it quiet because it shows the U.N. in a poor light.”
“There are legal ramifications if we leave the U.N. site,” the official overseeing designs for a planned renovation of the Secretariat, John Clarkson, said this week.
“All of the member states have their missions in Midtown, so going downtown would also create immense traffic and security issues,” he said.
In addition to the symbolism of moving the United Nations to ground zero, there would have been economic benefits to the plan, experts said. It would have freed up prime real estate for development along the East River while generating a hefty sum for the world body, and it would have helped the commercial real estate market downtown, which is still suffering from vacancies three years after the terrorist attacks, Mr. Panzer said.
“It makes a lot of sense to move the U.N. downtown, because it needs to expand and is landlocked by Midtown,” a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, Julia Vitullo-Martin, said. “There is also an enormous need for security surrounding the U.N., and building a fortress in a residential neighborhood is very undesirable.”
Mr. Panzer said the U.N. site and the World Trade Center site are “nearly identical in size, and it is much easier to build new than to renovate, which can cost up to 40% more.”
Before the terrorist attacks in 2001, the United Nations had passed a capital master plan to renovate its existing buildings for $1.2 billion – a plan Washington has agreed to finance.
The United Nations also has plans for an additional building to be erected on what is now part of Robert Moses Park, but the state Legislature has yet to pass a bill required to let the site be developed.
The project calls for erecting a 35-story office building that would temporarily house employees in the current Secretariat building while it undergoes renovation.
At some point in the future, the new building would be used to consolidate U.N. offices that are presently scattered around the city.
U.N. officials had emphasized that the project would disturb only part of the Robert Moses Park playground, which is currently used principally for roller hockey.