A RIVER RUNS THROUGH IT: A 27-acre park with its own Hudson River tributary extends north and south from Zapata's sculpted tower.

A dynamically sculpted 130-story tower forms the iconic center of a 12 million-square-foot mixed-use complex that includes 4 million square feet of residential units. Carlos Zapata depresses West Street from Chambers Street in the north to Battery Park in the south to create a narrow 27-acre park with a flowing waterway fed by the Hudson. Roughly following the original Manhattan waterfront, the new river widens near the Trade Center site and borders the Twin Towers' footprints as well as the edge of the new skyscraper. Zapata retains both footprints and tops them with a glass roof and a net of cables to create light wells for the subterranean levels of the site, densely occupied with stores and a new path station. Pedestrian bridges crossing the footprints connect the city grid on the east to the new memorial park. Parts of Zapata's structures hover over edges of the footprints. The architect reconnects Greenwich Street with a curved avenue that frees up four blocks to the east to be designed by other architects and developers, to ensure heterogeneity in the project.

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