FINANCIAL DISTRICT IS A HOT HOT HOT SPOT.

Some Thought The FINANCIAL DISTRICT Would Never Survive 9/11. They Were Wrong.

10 years ago, after stunned, ash-flaked New Yorkers marched wearily over the Brooklyn Bridge to escape the ravages of Ground Zero, many thought the Financial District would be collateral damage. Besides the death toll (2,753), physical damage (14 million square feet of office space) and jobs lost (65,000), more than 20,000 residents were, at least temporarily, uprooted. Many had only the clothes on their backs. Those who were banking that FiDi would become the next thriving residential neighborhood had to rethink the whole proposition. And yet, 10 years later, the neighborhood has more than doubled in size. (The Downtown Alliance puts the population at 56,000.) After years of squabbles, the World Trade Center site is moving forward. Hotels, rentals and condos have risen. Restaurants are open late. Strollers bump around in morning rush hour.

The 1990s
Giuliani was trying to do a modernization of downtown. Commercial vacancies were 40 percent. The city gave developers things like utility breaks & real estate tax abatements. Developers compensated for the neighborhood’s lack of services: a lounge with a flat-screen, a party room & rooftop terraces.

9/11/01 Panic & Mass Exodus
Will the towers fall? Tenants evacuated. The Fire Department came knocking door to door. They thought that the Millennium Hilton was going to come down,...they thought One Liberty was going to come down. In many cases, people just left. They left their leases. The mass exodus was really traumatic.

The Aftermath
For months, FiDi was a police zone; residents weren’t allowed in their homes. Many weren’t eager to return. Rents were drastically reduced. But values and prices sort of jumped back pretty quickly. The two big factors behind the bounce-back: The $20 billion federal cash infusion and the housing boom which went on from 2002 - 2008. There was a pioneering spirit and some people who wanted to be a little ahead of the curve. Ultimately those who bought decided that there was a clear effort by the city and the federal government to put a lot of money into rebuilding downtown. People realized, even after 2001 and the disaster of it, that the neighborhood was going to be rebuilt.

Becoming A Neighborhood & Big Commercial Tenants Arrived Too.
It was relatively busy during the day, but desolate at night. There were police officers around with machine guns. It was like having a private police force. Then the Amish market opened on John Street. The delicatessen began staying open to 12 o’clock. BMW came. Hermes came. Canali came. Restaurants came. The W Hotel opened & brought the BLT Bar & Grill & a lounge that's a credible nightlife destination. Whole Foods came on the edge of TriBeCa and Financial District. Even after the recession hit, buildings kept coming, from the massive to smaller boutique developments.

The Future. The Rebirth.
What will become of the World Trade Center site? There’ll be a great open space that will be really connected with Battery Park City. 1 WTC will be much better, more efficient and certainly more environmentally friendly. There’ll be much more light, much less heat, higher ceilings. Condé Nast is leasing 1 million square feet in the new WTC. There will be 10 million square feet of office space. There’s also going to be about half-a-million square feet of retail.

source: ny post