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Jul 20, 2007 5:56 am US/Eastern
Families Upset By Plans To Move 9/11 Ceremony
Construction Forces Move To Zuccotti Park
NEW YORK (CBS/AP) ―
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Families mourned at Ground Zero for the fifth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. (File photo)
AP
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Anniversary remembrances will move to a nearby park on September 11, 2007, because of construction at Ground Zero. (File photo)
AP
Relatives of 9/11 victims are opposing plans to commemorate the terror attacks' sixth anniversary in a small park instead of at the World Trade Center site, saying they want to mourn their loved ones closest to the place where they were killed.
"For us, and many Americans around the nation, the World Trade Center site is sacred ground," nine Sept. 11 family group leaders wrote in a letter this week. They also questioned how thousands of mourners would be able to fit into Zuccotti Park, southeast of Ground Zero. The park covers about three-quarters of an acre.
Thousands have gathered for past anniversary ceremonies on the western edge of the trade center site, in front of the World Financial Center. But Gov. Eliot Spitzer and Mayor Michael Bloomberg told victims' family members in a letter this week that the commemoration must be moved this year because of the expanding rebuilding work at the trade center site.
Digg This Story!Construction on tunnels leading from a proposed transit hub has begun in the area where past ceremonies have been held. A renewed search for the remains of 9/11 victims, which began last year on the western service road, has also extended to an area just in front of the World Financial Center.
Police officers, firefighters and emergency technicians who responded to the 2001 attack will read the names of the New York City victims this year, the letter said. Siblings, parents and children of the victims have read the names in past ceremonies.
"These men and women helped guide New York City and the nation through one of our darkest hours, and we are honored that they will join our ceremony as we remember and honor those we lost," the letter said.
As in past years, mourners will go silent and bells will toll four times during the ceremony, to mark the times that each of two hijacked jetliners crashed into each twin tower, and the times that each tower collapsed.
Two blue beams of light will shine in the night sky at sundown on 9/11.
(© 2007 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
