Multiple proposals emerge for ground zero

Tom Rogers's business is building memorials.

His company worked on the sleek black granite salute to Vietnam veterans and it is currently helping to craft the great arched plaza that will honor the dead from World War II on the mall in Washington.

But now Mr. Rogers finds himself in what he calls the "unenviable" position of contemplating a memorial to pay homage to his own daughter, Jean.

She was a flight attendant on American Airlines Flight 11 when it crashed into the World Trade Center on September 11.

"I know how these things are done and I have a deep personal interest in seeing that it's not rushed, that it's done right," he says.

As the cranes and backhoes continue to clear the now sprawling 16-acre site in lower Manhattan where almost 3,000 lives were lost, a new urgency grows around what to build there next. The clean-up could be complete as early as June, making way for construction.

But what to put there remains a disquieting dilemma: How do you balance the need to honor the dead and forever remind the living of the horror and heroism - and, at the same time, foster economic development in an area still crippled by the terrorists?

There are dozens of competing interests, each with their own ideas - from the developer that held the lease on the World Trade Center to the local bar owner in the neighborhood. It is a charged, emotional debate, but so far one in which great delicacy is being shown by all involved. And none more so than by the families of victims whose opinions reflect the vast - and sometimes contradictory - array of options, from turning the whole 16-acre site into a memorial, to rebuilding new towers of capitalist might as an answer to the terrorists' attack.

"This is something that's very important and very special for the whole country," says Stephen Push of Families of September 11th, who lost his wife in the crash at the Pentagon. "Centuries from now, people will look back at this as one of the most important events in the nation's history and what we put there has to reflect that."

The commission charged with the delicate task of finding a compromise worthy of a national tribute is spending the next four to eight weeks simply listening. Its chairman, John Whitehead, has said he'd like to build a monument to rival the Lincoln or Jefferson memorials. But he also signaled an interest in combining it with office buildings, restaurants, and cultural institutions, like museums. That raised some hackles among the families of the victims.

At the commission's second meeting last week, Mr. Whitehead said they were not yet ready to make any decisions.

"Every citizen has an interest in this undertaking, and we have been forming advisory boards so that the many constituencies involved can participate in the process," he says.

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