World Trade Center West Vent Blast Mitigation Design in New York

Those two buildings to the right are the “West Vent Structures”. One of them houses the new vent for the south (in bound) PATH tubes. (The outbound vent is inside Tower One.)

So the view of the vent structures from the west will soon be hidden by big trees lining West Street. Beyond serving a very necessary purpose for the infrastructure of the entire WTC site, the vent buildings will act as a noise buffer, minimizing sounds of traffic for the plaza area to the south and west of the pools.

The rest of the two structures is taken up by vent shafts for the memorial and museum as well as elevators, one for freight, and emergency egress stairs and some other things.

The main freight elevators and loading dock are in the south west corner and are completely underground.

So a neat little fact about the vent shafts in the “West Vent Structures”. They will also collect any rain that falls into them for use in the pools, watering the trees and landscape etc.. Most of the rain that falls on the WTC site will be stored and reused.

Memorial and Museum Update

Completion of the freight elevator within the North Vent Structure has enabled the north hoist to be removed, because the removal of the north hoist has facilitated the acceleration of the construction of the Memorial Plaza finishes in the area west of the North Fountain.

Blast Resistant Window Systems.