Talk:World Trade Center/GA1/Lead section

The World Trade Center (WTC) was a seven-building complex in Lower Manhattan (New York City) that was destroyed in the September 11 attacks. Its most prominent features were two Twin Towers that were each hit by a jet airliner, weakening them and leading to total collapse, killing a total of 2,750 people. In May 2002, ground was broken for new structures to be built on the World Trade Center site. The new complex will also be called the World Trade Center and will have six high-rise buildings set around the World Trade Center Memorial.

The World Trade Center was designed by Minoru Yamasaki in 1962-1964, using an innovative tube-frame structural design for the twin 110-story towers and for three smaller buildings. The elevator system in the towers utilized a combination of large-capacity express elevators and local elevators serving individual floors. Begun in 1966, the North Tower was completed in December 1970, while the South Tower was finished in July 1971. Construction of the World Trade Center involved excavating a large amount of material which was used to create Battery Park City on the west side of Lower Manhattan. An additional 47-floor building, 7 World Trade Center, was added in 1987.

Critics of the 1960s project questioned its right of eminent domain, its subsidization of office space, its aesthetics and its inhospitable environment. Once built, the complex flourished; some 50,000 workers and 200,000 visitors passed through each weekday. A 1975 fire affected six floors of the North Tower, and a 1993 bombing severely damaged the North Tower's underground parking garage and vital building facilities. Restrengthening followed each of the incidents, but on the morning of September 11, 2001, al-Qaeda-affiliated hijackers flew a Boeing 767 jet airliner into the North Tower followed by another into the South Tower; both towers were damaged enough by impact and the subsequent fires to fail structurally and collapse. Smaller buildings in the complex, 3, 4, 5 and 6 WTC, were crushed or severely damaged enough to warrant removal, and 7 WTC collapsed in the late afternoon due to structural damage from uncontrollable fires.

After nine months of cleanup and recovery, new construction was started at the site. 7 WTC was completed in May 2006, and five more office towers are under construction or in final planning stages, including the 1,368 foot Freedom Tower which is projected to be finished in 2013.