Many New Yorkers who blog here have told their tales of that horrible day and I think that most of us will never forget exactly where we were and what we were doing when we found out what happened.
The urge to "do something" was actually palpable. So many New Yorkers turned up at hospitals to give blood, for example, that they were, in many cases, being turned away. All the small acts of kindness and collective action simply can't be listed.
About a couple of months after the event, however, the Planning Center at the Municipal Art Society (MAS) convened a group of people, including some who'd lost family on 9/11, to see if a project couldn't be developed that would help shape, or at least influence, the future of downtown Manhattan in the aftermath.
Many activists had begun to worry that re-building lower Manhattan would be taken over solely by big Wall Street firms, corporate interests, and destructive political agendas. In short order, the World Trade Center site had taken on another meaning, one that wouldn't be well served by short term and narrow financial or other interests. Here's what Eva Hanhardt, the Director of MAS's Planning Center at that time, had to say, "Democracy is a value that we need to celebrate now more than ever. Knowledge comes from many sources, and before any decisions are made about the future of the city, it is imperative that people be given the opportunity to share their needs and hopes with each other and with decision-makers." Eva, along with Mike Kuo, whose dad died in the WTC tragedy, were the driving forces behind the new project.
And so, "Imagine New York: Giving Voice to the People's Visions" was born, with the help, eventually, of 150 civic and community organizations. Technically termed a "visioning" process, Imagine New York reached out to people throughout the metropolitan area and asked them to participate in workshops designed to figure out what kinds of activities, buildings, plans and ideas that they'd like to see at the site.
The response was overwhelming. I attended the first Imagine New York workshop on March 14, 2002. (My company was charged with getting the word out about the project to the media.) It was held on the Lower East Side and in three different languages. This was an area of the City mere moments from the Trade Center site, but an area whose health - both physical and financial - had been largely ignored in the aftermath of 9/11, for the usual reasons - race, class, lack of clout. Many of the people at that first workshop were participating in this kind of "democratic process" for the very first time. Older Chinese women and men "visioned" New York in their own language and, for many, it was the very first time anyone had asked their opinion about anything related to the City, its future, its life. What was most impressive was the intense concentration and sense of importance that everyone brought to the workshop. A couple of people had to actually remove themselves from workshop groups to stand outside and cry.
230 of these facilitated workshops were held throughout the five boroughs and parts of New Jersey, and other "visions" poured in through the public website. In the end, 3500 Imagine NY participants contributed more than 19,000 ideas. I watched groups of people come together for workshops who thought they had nothing in common, who looked wildly different from each other, but who all worked diligently through the visioning process. A series of workshops were held again after the finalists for the WTC memorial were chosen. You can actually see some of those ideas here.
Every single public comment was counted and taken into account. I know, because I was one of more than a hundred or so people who carefully unrolled countless large workshop worksheets and categorized each of the thousands and thousands of comments. There was no tyranny of the majority.
Imagine New York most definitely had an effect on the downtown process and, at a minimum, it clearly profoundly effected the lives of those who participated, even if they only participated by email or snail mail.
Five years later, Imagine New York still stands as a testament to what's possible within a real democracy and within the context of pain and national tragedy. It taught us that, with patience, we can and we must create places where people are better connected. That was the main message echoed over and over again by the thousands of Imagine New York participants.
Five years later, our own government continues to stab this lesson through the heart.