One World Trade Center

September 19, 2011 at 12:19 pm aepcentral 1 comment

Matt Barcus
President, Precision Executive Search, Inc
Managing Partner, CivilEngineeringCentral.com
View Matt’s profile & connect with him on LinkedIn

Two Sunday’s ago we honored the heroes and victims of 9/11 not only across the United States, but around the globe; they will never be forgotten.

I just wanted to take a moment on our blog today to recognize those thousands of engineers, architects, planners, surveyors, and construction workers from the AEC industry who are now rebuilding at ground zero. The beautiful memorial, “Reflecting Absence,” designed by architect Michael Arad, is simple yet powerful. Equally as amazing, yet still under construction is what will be known as One World Trade Center; take a look at some of these facts:

* Height – 1776 to the spire, 1356 to the roof – this will make it the tallest building in the United States
* 3.2M Square Feet
* Estimated Cost: $3.2B
* Recognized as the most complex public works project in American History
* Being built on top of a subway
* Materials include steel girders that measure 60′ tall and weigh 70 tons each; blast walls made with 18K/square foot concrete; blast resistant glass on the top 20 floors; and a framework of armored concrete core designed to prevent “cascading catastrophic failure” that we all witnessed on 9/11
* 3500+ construction workers working around the clock

Take a look at this video of Matt Lauer touring One World Trade Center with Chris Ward, Executive Director of the Port Authority of New York/New Jersey:

Though I am far from an engineer myself, I have always been amazed and fascinated by the work of engineers and architects. Imagine the collaboration, the patience, the imagination and creativity, and the amount of American spirit that is involved by these professionals working on this project. The complexities involved with this project from all perspectives – civil engineering, structural engineering, geotechnical engineering, MEP engineering, environmental, architecture, construction – is mind-blowing to me. Not to mention the politics and public input.

I guess what I am trying to say here is…WOW…and THANK YOU! I believe this is a project that absolutely needed to be done, despite the cost, and thank you to all of those who are a part of it. And to the most of you who are not a part of it, thank you for all that you do. Engineers typically are low profile and are not recognized for the amazing and critical work that they do on a daily basis…so thank you!

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Entry filed under: Civil Engineering, civil engineering blog, Uncategorized, US Infrastructure. Tags: Michael Arad.