Today is 21 years since the Twin Towers were felled.

The world now mourns Queen Elizabeth,who reigned from
21 years before the Towers opened in 1973,to 21 years
after they fell.

We have not seen the rebuilding the site deserves...
though adding a few floors to the last design for the
still-on-hold new 2 WTC would at last restore the lost
roof and occupied height to the 16 acres.

The case against that is weaker than ever...the
Nordstrom/Central Park Tower has opened with its 1,550
foot roof,and late last year approval was granted for
an even taller structure at 175 Park Avenue,cut from
the proposed 1,646 feet to 1,575,still over two hundred
feet above the "people will never dare go that high again"
height of the Twins:

https://newyorkyimby.com/2021/12/175-park-avenues-1575-foot-tall-design-gains-approval-in-midtown-east-manhattan.html
https://www.citysignal.com/tallest-building-in-nyc-175-park-ave

This building would replace the 1919 Commodore Hotel
later operated (as the first project for which people
outside Queens heard of Donald Trump) as the Grand Hyatt
and Hyatt Grand Central,with Hyatt operating a hotel on
the new building's upper floors over millions of square
feet of office and retail space...the existing building
will begin demolition next year and completion of the
supertall is expected in 2030.

The development would be combined with transit improvements
(anyone going from Grand Central to the WTC site is likely
to take the subway station under the building,which also
goes over the "Lexington Passage" from GCT east).It lies
directly across 42nd Street from the Chanin Building and
directly across Lexington Avenue from the Chrysler Building.

The Chrysler Building is 925 feet to the top of the structure
proper and 1,046 feet to the top of its spire and the Chanin
(which opened in January 1929 when excavations for the Chrysler
were at bedrock,and was replaced by the Chrysler as tallest
building in Midtown) is 649 feet to the top of the structure
proper and 680 feet to the top of its spire.So if you disregard
their spires,the new building is set to be taller than the two
of them stacked on top of each other.

One Vanderbilt,two blocks away,already blocks views west
from the Chrysler,and 200 Park Avenue (opened in 1962) crosses
the avenue three blocks north of the Chanin (whose crown lights
could once be seen 40 miles north on a clear night)...but
the new building once again underlines the bankruptcy of the
timidity that crippled the initial rebuilding of the World
Trade Center.A healthy city keeps producing superlative
architectural icons.

Never settle for the unacceptable.

-=-=-
The World Trade Center towers MUST rise again,
at least as tall as before...or terror has triumphed.