"We need to push aside individual financial interests and focus on what's best for our city," he continued. "That means it's time to pick up the pace of commercial construction, and to build for uses that reflect the realities of the market and the needs of Lower Manhattan -like the retail development that's so crucial to linking the site back into the life of the city."

In response, Janno Lieber, director of World Trade Center development for the Silverstein organization, says, "We share the Mayor's goal of rebuilding the World Trade Center site as swiftly as possible and welcome his involvement. The Silverstein organization is eager and determined to move forward as quickly as the government bureaucracies will allow."

He notes that the firm will build towers 2, 3 and 4 just as soon as the government delivers the physical sites. "As City Hall is well aware, the Port Authority has not yet begun this key preparation work, including excavating the sites and building a protective slurry wall, and will therefore not be able to deliver the sites to Silverstein--or anyone else--or some time. It's unclear how the business proposal included in the Mayor's speech today addresses this, the largest obstacle to a timely rebuilding."