Community Board 1 voted 29 to 1 with 19 abstentions Monday night to support a plan to build a Muslim community center near Ground Zero, according to an article yesterday in The New York Daily News by Rob Sgobbo and Samuel Goldsmith.
The proposed center is called the Cordoba House and the article said it would "rise as many as 13 stories two blocks north of where the twin towers" of the World Trade Center stood and had been demolished in the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
The center wants to build it on the site of 45 Park Place, a five-story Italian Renaissance-style building that was considered for designation by the Landmarks Preservation Commission about 20 years ago and has been used by the Burlington Coat Factory store. The commission never acted on the proposed designation but recently a spokesperson indicated that it would soon reconsider it.
The planned center would include a 500-seat performing arts center, a culinary school, a swimming pool, a restaurant and other amenities.
The center has been estimated to cost about $100 million and Iman Feisal Abdul Rauf, who has proposed the center and has held services nearby since 1983 told the meeting that the center would help "bridge and heal a divide" among Muslims and other religious groups," adding that "we have condemned the actions of 9/11.
The article said that Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, City Council Speaker Christine E. Quinn and Manhattan Borough President Scott M. Stringer have endorsed the project.
A rendering of the center indicated that its white facade will be filigreed.
The proposed center is called the Cordoba House and the article said it would "rise as many as 13 stories two blocks north of where the twin towers" of the World Trade Center stood and had been demolished in the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
The center wants to build it on the site of 45 Park Place, a five-story Italian Renaissance-style building that was considered for designation by the Landmarks Preservation Commission about 20 years ago and has been used by the Burlington Coat Factory store. The commission never acted on the proposed designation but recently a spokesperson indicated that it would soon reconsider it.
The planned center would include a 500-seat performing arts center, a culinary school, a swimming pool, a restaurant and other amenities.
The center has been estimated to cost about $100 million and Iman Feisal Abdul Rauf, who has proposed the center and has held services nearby since 1983 told the meeting that the center would help "bridge and heal a divide" among Muslims and other religious groups," adding that "we have condemned the actions of 9/11.
The article said that Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, City Council Speaker Christine E. Quinn and Manhattan Borough President Scott M. Stringer have endorsed the project.
A rendering of the center indicated that its white facade will be filigreed.
Architecture Critic
Carter Horsley
Since 1997, Carter B. Horsley has been the editorial director of CityRealty. He began his journalistic career at The New York Times in 1961 where he spent 26 years as a reporter specializing in real estate & architectural news. In 1987, he became the architecture critic and real estate editor of The New York Post.
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