New Yorkers - is it creepy for tourists to go to Ground Zero?

Question

I'm a lifelong New Yorker. I used to work in the World Trade Center before 9/11 - and, after the terrorist attacks, I was one of the 17,000 men and women who helped to repair the damage.

So, I've always found it a bit creepy to see that the hole where the two great towers used to be has become a tourist attraction.

I know that the tourists are trying to show their respect, but it does seem kinda gruesome, considering that 2,900 people were murdered at that site on that tragic day.

What do other folks think?

Answer 1

I work at One Liberty Plaza, and it sickens me to see people posing and smiling for pictures all along the area. It shoudn't be the spectacle as it is. Especially for the foreigh tourists. They are the most disrespectful, taking smiling pictures, gestures, and they're inconsiderate to those who work in the area. Its nice that there's construction on Church Street to deter the crowds, but it sucks.

Also, those damn vendors who sell 9/11 crap memorabilia are rude con-artists.

Answer 2

I do think it's a little weird but I'm not a tourist. I had a job off of Wall St. and I walked over there about a month after it happened. I stood there for about a minute and realized I had no idea what I was looking for. Any feeling I felt while standing there could not match how I felt that entire week after 9/11. I thought each move I made would be my last because a nuclear blast could wipe us out at any second. I practically peed my pants every time I heard a place overhead. I had to let go and accept that we were all going to die.

I don't need to stare at the hole in the ground where the WTC stood to feel closer to the events of that day. For me, taking a picture wouldn't make any sense. I know what happened, I lived through it. A photo doesn't connect me to what happened that day. I'm speaking as a New Yorker. I think people outside the city don't have the same connection. No matter how scared they were that day they still had a buffer zone that could provide some comfort and disconnection. Maybe they need pictures and souvenirs so that they can have more of a tangible connection to the place. It's something they can take with them.

People visit Babi Yar in Kiev where the Nazis slaughtered about 100,000 people and tossed them into the ravine. I'd probably want to take a picture if I ever went there even though it is a little tacky (though I don't think I'd be posing and smiling!) It could act as a connection to the event since I didn't live through it. I think it's the same for tourists at the WTC.

Answer 3

I used to live in New York, luckily I didn't lose anyone that day. I am really thankful that my brother didn't land a job in the towers he was up for.

I have not been able to go down there on visits back. I go out of my way to avoid the area. I just can't do it - I don't want to see the actual physical change, knowing what was there before and having been inside the towers while they stood. I was in the area for the first bombing in 1993 and that was bad enough for me. It is gruesome...but I think that that will fade as it did with the Civil War sites, the concentration camps of the Nazis and Pearl Harbor. We will grow old and the newer generation will look at it as just a historical site, where something horrific happened. We don't have the luxury of detachment yet.

I always wondered how the tourists react when seeing the site - it must be like visiting Auschwitz in a way. An important spot - but something of a chore that you would need to mentally steel your self for.

Not sure when I would be able to do it myself.

Answer 4

Whether we like it or not, 9/11 is part f US history. Years after the attack to Pearl Harbor people still go there to remember, or learn more about the history that happened there. Ground Zero will always be part of history and I guess that it's not that people are morbid, is that they might want to feel the pain that others felt and also be able to say "I was there". It was a horrific time in our life and I dont think that people go there out of morbidity, but out of compassion, pain they still feel and feel the history before they build other buildings on that site again.

Answer 5

I'm a New Yorker. I visit the site every year on the anniversary. I do it to pay my respects to my fellow New Yorkers and human beings who perished that day. They were people too, just like all of us. It is a piece of American history, and unfortunately, we must accept that this dispicable act occurred, not shun it away as though it never happened.

To answer your question: I find it disturbing that Ground Zero is considered a tourist attraction. It is hallowed ground, where nearly 3,000 people lost their lives; it is not a spectacle. For tourists to smile as they pose for pictures just makes me sick. If you wanna do that there's a place called Times Square just a train ride away.

Answer 6

I think it is just absurd. I have no idea why people flock to the site. Why not flock to the nearest cemetery?

Why aren't these same people going down to New Orleans to stand around and stare at that?

I think people just want to feel connected to it in some way. They want to be able to say "I've been affected by this" - like it makes them a better American or something like that.

I have lived in NYC my whole life. I've never gone down there to "sight see" and I won't take friends from out of town there.

Answer 7

I do think that it is creepy. I didn't understand why tourists would want to go to see the construction...there's nothing to see. And reading the post about people smiling for pictures and vendors selling stuff is sick, too. I was in NYC when it happened, and it still pains me to think of all the suffering that happened that day. I understand that for people who did lose someone that day, it is like visiting their friend's gravesite. Very sad, and should not be a tourist attraction. That's too disrespectful.

Answer 8

i live in ny and never have and never will go there
it is hallowed ground not a tourist attraction to gawk at
i will never understand the morbid need people have to go see the wtc or the site of the oklahoma bombing
as a tourist
if you lost someone there it is different because it may be the only place you have to go and remember your loved one
that is respect not morbid curiosity

Answer 9

People go to memorials to pay their respects (usually, and hopefully), not to gawk.

Memorials are eerie, but perfectly acceptable as most people are very respectful and pay their tributes.

Memorials teach us about the past, and make us never forget about it. They also help us remember how cities come together after tragedy, and are essentially a lited candle for the dead.

They're a good thing.

Answer 10

Personally, I think it's cathartic. I used to work at 7 WTC and was there in 1993 when the first attack occurred.