Nick Michlewicz '07, student assistant to the Urban Imagination Group, a group working to establish an urban studies concentration at the College, introduced Garvin and also detailed some of Garvin's many accomplishments. In addition to his 15 months at the LMDC, Garvin has worked as a real estate developer and has taught at Yale University as an adjunct professor for 39 years. Garvin is currently the managing director of planning for NYC2012, the committee trying to bring the 2012 Olympics to New York City.
While Garvin said that he has not spoken frequently about lower Manhattan, his lecture addressed the rebuilding of lower Manhattan from the planning phases through pictures of what the area should eventually look like.
Garvin started his lecture with what might seem like a surprising statement about the World Trade Centers. "Many of you think of [the World Trade Center] as a great thing; I did not," he said.
The issues that Garvin had with the World Trade Center helped to shape his ideas of what the area should and could be like in the future. Garvin did not like that the World Trade Center area was separated from the rest of Manhattan and that the surrounding streets were closed. "This was a part of the city that was really separate from everything else," he said. "One of the first things I did when I got to the LMDC was advocate that the streets be reopened."
Garvin explained that in July 2002, the LMDC displayed six plans for rebuilding. "We opened an exhibit of six alternate plans," he said. "The public [had a] violent reaction against them."
The negative reaction the six plans received prompted the LMDC to solicit more proposals. Firms from every continent except Antarctica submitted proposals for the area.
Garvin said that selecting the right proposal involved visiting other prominent memorials including the Montgomery, Ala., Civil Rights Memorial and the memorial in Oklahoma City for the victims of the bombing there. After seeing the Southern Poverty Law Center, which is part of the Oklahoma memorial, Garvin had a realization. "A memorial does not have to be a monument," he said. "It could be actions you took on behalf of people."
Garvin explained that he wanted the public to be part of the memorial. "What we build ought to be like in Casablanca," he said. "Everyone should go there like everyone goes to Rick's."
In December 2002, the LMDC exhibited nine proposals for the rebuilding. The proposals were also viewable on the Internet. In February 2003, the LMDC announced that the plan designed by Daniel Libeskind had been selected. Garvin called Libeskind's plan "shatteringly original."
Part of Libeskind's plan involved a Freedom Tower. The building will be the tallest in the world, although in an interesting way: a television antenna on top of the Tower will make it the tallest building in the world at 1,776 feet. Garvin explained that the antenna gives the building that impressive distinction and had a practical element-since the building is shorter, it requires one set, rather than two sets, of elevator banks.
Garvin left the LMDC in 2003 feeling confident that the project was going well. "I resigned my position convinced we were on the right target," he said. Garvin called the Tower a "perfectly successful building."
However, in his concluding remarks it became clear that Garvin also has some reservations about the project. "Sometimes I think this process has been a sham," he said, referring to the politics and strategizing that went on. Regardless, Garvin admitted that the entire process is a "great story that is unfolding."
Garvin did not make conclusions about the final project because it is still unclear what the end result will be. "Things in lower Manhattan are evolving constantly," he said.