New York 9/11 memorial teaches valuable lesson

Before serving as Penn’s vice president for Facilities and Real Estate Services, Anne Papageorge oversaw the design of the approximately $1 billion 9/11 memorial in New York, which is scheduled to open this Sunday.

Papageorge initially worked at the Department of Design and Construction, where she dealt with the cleanup of the World Trade Center following the 9/11 attacks. She was stationed at the Pier 94 command center, from which the American Red Cross and city, state and federal agencies operated. Such command centers were created to deal with issues such as moving large pieces of steel from the rubble and dredging the piers around Lower Manhattan to clean the site.

When a colleague in city government who worked for the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation reached out to Papageorge in 2004 about the design director position for the 9/11 memorial, she seized the opportunity.

“I think that those of us who worked on the cleanup felt the need to do something more positive than just clean up the destruction. I really wanted to be part of creating the future of that site,” she said.

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As the design director, she negotiated contracts, held multiple project meetings a week, monitored the design’s progress and presented it to stakeholder groups, public officials and the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation board. Later Papageorge was promoted to the role of senior vice president and managed the project budget, worked to justify increases in construction costs and negotiated with the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and the Metropolitan Transit Authority.

Competing projects and interests created numerous obstacles for Papageorge. Sewers, subways and other underground utilities caused issues, as did the pressure of constantly responding to the media. In addition, groups of victims’ relatives assembled to challenge design aspects of the project.

However, many positive groups were also formed. “There were many family members who were on the board and were critical to moving the project along,” she said.

Opening on the 10th anniversary of the attacks, the memorial will feature a large square that spans four city blocks, a flat plane covered with trees and two 200-by-200 feet “footprints” of the buildings, where holes with fountains will display the names of the World Trade Center, Pentagon and Shanksville, Pa., victims.

“It was probably the most difficult experience of my life,” Papageorge said. “I underestimated the emotional component to the project.”

Just as construction began, Papageorge left the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation to join the University in October 2006. Many of the lessons she learned while working on the 9/11 memorial have been relevant to her work with Penn Park, which will open next week.

“Dealing with community members, the Penn community and trustees is very comparable to what we went through,” she said. “There are pieces to it that are very similar.”

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