Marketers selling office space in the future office megatower that will rise out of the hole at ground zero, where the Twin Towers used to stand, have ditched the name “Freedom Tower.” Instead they’ve been marketing the 1,776-foot building using its address, One World Trade Center. “It’s the one that is easiest for people to identify with,” Port Authority chairman Anthony Coscia said. “And frankly, we’ve gotten a very interested and warm reception to it.” Governor Pataki, who came up with the “Freedom Tower” name during a speech in 2003, bristled at the change. “The Freedom Tower is not simply another piece of real estate and not just a name for marketing purposes,” he said. “In design and name, it is symbolic of our commitment to rise above the attacks of Sept. 11. Where 1 and 2 World Trade Center once stood, there will be a memorial with two voids to honor the heroes we lost — and, in my view, those addresses should never be used again.” Yet in a snap poll this morning on NY1, most voters who texted in said they liked the new name change. It strikes us that when the building opens as scheduled in 2014, after ten years of thinking of it that way, people will call it the Freedom Tower no matter name what a bunch of marketers use in pitch meetings — kind of like how people still say they’re going to take the “1/9” somewhere even though the 9 train no longer exists. What do you think?
’Freedom’ out at WTC: Port Authority says The Freedom Tower is now 1 World Trade Center [NYDN]
