40 Years Ago Today: The Opening of the World Trade Center

[R68 Subway Car]

It was on this date 40 years ago that the World Trade Center was opened to the public.

 

 

 

 

[SI1980]

Great photographs. Thank you for sharing them.

 

I remember I visited the complex shortly after the opening day in 1973, since I used to work in lower Manhattan in the early 1970s. It was a beautiful complex at the time of its completion. For a couple of years, I used to watch the workers construct one floor at a time in both towers. I had a good view from where I worked, and I sometimes was near the construction site as well. 

 

Although some considered them as ugly structures, I always thought the towers were really beautiful. They were, without no doubt, great achievements of architecture in their time. They'll be missed.

[Guest MTA Bus]

That first picture is beautiful. R.I.P Twin Towers. You are not frogotten.

[Via Garibaldi 8]

Those towers symbolized everything that was New York City... Bold, unique and beautiful even with its faults.  I still remember that morning well and remember going to the site and seeing the destruction even months later for blocks and then riding the ferry to and from work that summer from Staten Island with them missing from the sky.  Very sad because there was a sense that something was off... It's great that they're rebuilding down there and while I wish the built back the twin towers, at least they redesigned the one tower which is coming along nicely.  Never forget.

[LRG]

I remember going inside that building once, sometime in 2000 when I was eight. I only stayed in the lobby, however.

 

Those buildings were something else...after they were destroyed, every time I crossed either the Manhattan or Williamsburg Bridges, it was hard to come to terms with the fact that the buildings were missing. I would think for a second "didn't something use to be there" and then I would realize "oh yeah, right...they're gone now". At least they're putting something back, abut as nice as the new building is coming along, I still think they should have put back two towers. For some personal reason, I feel that by them putting back just one building when they knocked down two, it doesn't make us look that great. But that's just me.

[B35 via Church]

United we stand !

[JubaionBx12+SBS]

Nice photos. Although I have to say the original WTC just looks odd without something west of it (as in the first picture).

[DJ MC]

I saw these magnificent towers in 2000 and they were something that really had you looking into the sky just to see them. It was one of those buildings that you could not take your eyes off of, practically memorizing. That's how amazing it was. Even though replacements are being built, you can't replace the original.

[Minato ku]

While the new 1 WTC skyscraper is filling the gap, I always thought that there is something missing in the skyline of Lower Manhattan without the World Trate Center.  I am a fan of skyscrapers as much as a fan of transit, so you can understand my feelings and my sadness.

 

In the other hand, I was against the idea to rebuild the World Trate Center with same design.

Rebuiding the World Trate Center, yes but with a contemporary design.

This is not about the WTC, I am against the idea of neo historic architecture for about everything.