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Ruined building still lurks at ground zero

Tainted by toxic waste from the Sept. 11 attacks, the old Deutsche Bank AG building is now a source of concern for its neighbors.

By ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published May 24, 2006

NEW YORK - While debates rage about why more buildings have not gone up at the World Trade Center site, there is one, shrouded in a web of black netting and full of trade center dust, that can't seem to come down.

The vacant 41-story former Deutsche Bank AG building looms above ground zero, contaminated with toxic waste and still holding tiny body parts more than four years after the trade center collapsed onto it on Sept. 11, 2001. Removing it from the landscape has become a more challenging task than cleaning up the twin towers.

"That's more or less a vertical Superfund site, and we're living right next to it," said neighborhood resident Esther Regelson, referring to a federal program for cleaning up the nation's most polluted industrial sites.

The eyesore presents different problems for a business district struggling to coax companies back to office space destroyed by terrorists. The first rebuilt skyscraper near ground zero, 7 World Trade Center, opened Tuesday with less than one-fifth of its space rented.

Development officials hope to bring down the building over the next year, making way for a new tower that could offer apartments or a hotel. But the cleanup that began last fall has stalled repeatedly as the Environmental Protection Agency and other regulators cited contractors for violations.

Construction workers, helped by the Fire Department, have another, wrenching task as they sift through debris. They have recovered more than 600 tiny bone fragments that had not been found in searches of the building shortly after the attacks.

Before the cleanup began, the 32-year-old building was embroiled in a legal battle between the company, insurers and the government over who was responsible for it.

The tower sat untouched for months after the collapsing south tower tore into it, leaving a 15-story gash in its facade. The building became infested with mold caused by moisture from fire sprinklers and also contains asbestos, lead, mercury and toxic dust from the trade center.

The Lower Manhattan Development Corp., the state agency overseeing rebuilding at ground zero, bought the tower for $90-million two years ago after "the private sector was unable to create a solution," agency president Stefan Pryor said.

[Last modified May 24, 2006, 05:26:10]