Executive Summary

A World Development Endowment Foundation Project Governors Island as a World Resource Center

A Vision for the Future Development of New York Harbor as a Global Cultural Center

World Development Endowment Foundation 126 Fifth Avenue, Suite 3D New York, New York 10011-5606 Gerald Greenberg Chairman and Co-Founder

Governors Island Preservation and Education Corporation 10 South Street, Slip 7 New York, New York 10004 Submitted on May 10, 2006
Copyright 2006 by the World Development Endowment Foundation. All Rights Reserved

Unifying the Harbor

Over the past decade the World Development Endowment Foundation (WDEF) has been refining a plan for the re-use and development of Governors Island as an international city within an international city dedicated to public service. In developing our vision we have thought of Governors Island as far more than a real estate development. It is about people development. The WDEF envisions a bold, creative, and aggressive urban plan that is realistic and practical and that will articulate and enhance the development GIPEC has imagined. The Island will both require and support a large number of employees and visitors. We believe such magnitude is necessary if Governors Island is to attain the inspiring objectives GIPEC has established: to enhance the role of New York on the world stage . . . [and] to create an architectural icon, and serve as a world model for large self-sustaining developments (Governors Island Development Framework). The development of Governors Island gives New York City and New York State an opportunity to create a new international institution that reflects and builds on the presence of 180 nationalities living in the City. This new institution must have a stature comparable to that of the United Nations, renowned universities, and international philanthropic and financial institutions. Therefore we propose to develop Governors Island as a home for programs advancing world unity, as a new urban planning icon, and as a global destination emphasizing learning. When fully evolved, Governors Island will include a permanent world trade fair, cultural centers, an international education and youth leadership center, world wellness and life science center, arts and entertainment venues, hotels, a world conference center, with commercial offices, and a world philanthropic center. Our overall concept is that of a World Cultural Exchange that will be referred to as World Island. It is essential that we recognize the need to unify New York Harbor. Our plan thus interlaces links in Lower Manhattan, Red Hook, and the Peninsula at Bayonne. It will be designed to maximize and blend the various waterfront projects (East River, Brooklyn Bridge Park, Brooklyn Piers 7-12, Gateway, etc.), Liberty Island, and Ellis Island into a social and economic dynamo and global hub. We are convinced that only such a bold and comprehensive initiative can, at one and the same time, capitalize on and extend New York Citys unique position in the world and overcome the development barriers presented by deed restrictions, weather, building conditions, and Island access. In particular, we emphasize our intention to create a place where multinational corporations, NGOs, EDCs, municipalities, emerging entrepreneurs, philanthropies and not-for-profits from around the world can interact face-to-face in a social, cultural, and physical environment unmatched by any other in the world. This will give a large number of people a must reason to visit the Island time and again, thus making it economically self-sustaining. Without such

a far-reaching and compelling purpose the Island cannot fully maximized and developed in a sustainable way. The scope of activity on the southern part of the Island will be a magnet for attracting the world to the many diverse activities, thus constituting the core activity needed to animate the Island all day and every day of the year. Because this commercial activity is specifically oriented toward tourism, trade, and economic development, it will support and enhance the overall educational and cultural goals of the Island. Taken in total, the unique blend of programming on the Island will be host to a diverse population as they experience discovery. The real estate planning and design of existing and new structures will integrate state-of-the-art environmentally sustainable design concepts, advanced technologies, and exciting innovations on a scale and magnitude never before realized in a single endeavor. The new Governors Island will stand as a worldwide model for a totally integrated, sustainable design development.

The Four Pillars of a Community

World Island will be built upon the four pillars that are embodied in the heart of every vital community: Commerce, Culture, Education, and Spirituality. The Island is a powerful tourist attraction, naturally suited to cultural and educational uses, and these in turn will attract a new cohort of international visitors to the city. The Island is an ideal gathering place where people from around the world can interact on common ground and share and experience one anothers ideas and ideals. In the context of New York Citys unique multi-cultural community the Island will also be a key center for international economic development and education. In order to realize the full-potential of this unique Island in a unique city, Commerce: Trade has been critical to cultural and social evolution for over 10,000 years. Even while people caravanned great distances to exchange goods and services, they also learn about one another and gain new and useful ideas. The development of the commercial aspect of our plan will include specialized offices, conference and exhibit centers and hotels, specifically targeted at economic development corporations (EDCs), non-governmental organizations (NGOs), foundations, corporate philanthropists, and many other international entities serving related purposes. Our objective is to create a critical mass of organizations concerned with economic development (at the municipal and regional levels), trade, tourism, and other community-based initiatives. These organizations will want need to be here because its environment has been created for the express purpose of transacting international affairs in a public sphere of action and influence. Culture: Every group, every nation, has customs and ways of life; broadly considered these constitute the groups culture. Culture exists in its purest form in the expressive arts of music, painting and sculpture, story telling and literature, in various forms of entertainment and recreation, and in the distinctive ways people create the things of every day life and prepare their food. World Island will be a beacon for the best and brightest in the worlds cultures.

Education: Culture must be learned, and so education will be central to World Island. A World High School will educate youth from around the world in the privileges and demands of public service. Distance learning will connect the Island to nations around the globe. Seminars and training programs will educate the business community and public officials in the ways of trade, equitable dealing, and economic development. Beyond this, the very nature of the programming means that every trip to the island will have an educational aspect, will give the visitor or employees new insights. The Islands cultural and educational programs will make World Island a powerful tourist magnet, attracting a vast eclectic mix of international visitors to it and the surrounding region. The range of programs on the Island will make every visit an educational one. Spirituality: The World Island philosophy is grounded in a simple truth recognized by all the worlds religions: All we are is what we are to each other. If we are to prosper in the twenty-first century we must each extend that truth to everyone, without exception. And we must extend this reverence and respect to the earth itself. It is our home together. It is in this sense that we must understand World Islands design and construction in a spiritual context. World Island will be a model of environmentally friendly construction and design. At the southern tip of the Island we plan to build a futuristic lighthouse, Illumination, that will be the focus of spiritual activities on the Island. It will contain inter-faith chapels and meditation rooms. Beyond this, we regard World Islands commitment to wellness and to green design as fundamentally spiritual in kind. Organizing our programs around these four pillars will ensure WDEFs cornerstone mission: establishing a self-sustaining, socially responsible model city that serves as an ideal environment in which to mentor and nurture future leaders in public service. Only in this way can we all understand the practicality of trustworthiness. The synergies we are exploiting require a unified, comprehensive and complementary approach if the total development is to become the icon that defines human potential in the twenty-first century.

Wisdom Keepers/Wisdom Seekers

World Island is designed as a destination attracting over 12,000,000 tourists a year to the City. It will be served by over 50,000 employees from the boroughs of the City. This urban plan will be one of the largest private sector employers in New York States history and will be a model for human rights in human resource development. A mentoring program will be implemented entitled Wisdom Keepers/Wisdom Seekers partnering senior citizens with our youth as a generational connection. This initiative will be a stimulus for major social and economic impact benefiting all New Yorkers.

Urban Plan for Unifying the Harbor: Creating Common Ground

While we have explored and developed an abundance of specific features, our project is an umbrella development, and our overall program is organized to

incorporate ideas developed by many other people and organizations, including the many sound initiatives of other RFEI participants. Our overall urban plan consists of sites in four locations: Governors Island the entire Island Lower Manhattan Battery Maritime Building and the Coast Guard building Red Hook, Brooklyn Bayonne, NJ The Peninsula (formerly the Military Ocean Terminal at Bayonne) Additionally, we propose to lower a prefabricated tunnel into the riverbed connecting Lower Manhattan to the Island, running across the Island, and connecting with Red Hook. With a peak capacity of 30,000 people per hour, such a transportation system is the only way to provide the convenient high-capacity access the Island demands. Initial studies indicated that this is a realistic transportation solution, both financially and practically. Governors Island is the focal point of our plan. Red Hook and Bayonne provide access to and back room logistics for the Island as well as having stand-alone components. The Battery Maritime Building has components of its own while the Coast Guard building would be reconstructed as the Manhattan-side terminus of the tunnel, where it can link with the subway system.

Lower Manhattan: BMB and Coast Guard Building

We intend to develop the BMB as a part of the overall cultural exchange complex exploiting unparalleled views of the harbor and as the Manhattan-side gateway to Governors Island. This program element will honor and cherish the history of the BMB, Governors Island and New York, in compliance with GIPECs guidelines. In particular we seek to enhance the ferry experience so as to strengthen the relationship between the BMB and the Island. We have been holding preliminary discussions with the U.S. Coast Guard about using their site as the Manhattan terminus of the people-mover tunnel we propose. We would construct the new building at that site that would accommodate both the tunnel and the Coast Guard offices. Additionally, we propose to create an interactive theatre where the U. S. Coast Guard can host and honor coast guards from around the world. This new structure will enrich and enhance the East River / Battery Park flow and thereby help unify the harbor.

Historic District
The WDEF will develop the Historical District along the lines of Mystic Seaport and Williamsburg and as an education and retreat destination. We have met with many historic preservation specialists, including Charles Rigby, with whom we have formed an alliance to include his New York Time Exchange (an interactive theater-museum) into the Historical District. We will house at least two educational institutes here: 1) the International Institute of Peace through Tourism and 2) the Sustainable Living Institute. We will also partner with the Global University System (GUS), an existing institution partially funded by UNESCO, GUS is organized to provide distance learning throughout the world at the secondary and college levels.

By use of the Island's natural topography and existing structures, the full flavor of the Historical District will be preserved and distingished from the southern part of the Island, with Building 400 serving as a natural barrier and transition point from the Past to the Present and to the Future portions of our program. We will develop Building 400 as an international crafts emporium, Hands Around the World. Working with the Aid to Artisans group, a not-for-profit organization that represents international artisans, we will invite craftspeople from the villages of the world to demonstrate and teach their skills, and to exhibit and sell their work. When visitors pass from the Historical District into Building 400 they will move from the villages of the United States to the villages of the rest of the world. We will review our plans and proposals with the National Park Service to ensure that they are compatible with NPS plans. Additionally, we are establishing the Sustainable Living Institute, which can work with the NPS to promote smart planetary stewardship throughout NPS territory.

South Island and Red Hook

Programming for the rest of the Island and Red Hook is explicitly international and would be housed in new buildings designed by the core design team specifically selected for this project, as well as signature architects and consultants from around the world. Examples of programming include: Culture and Education Harmony Hall: interactive exhibits presenting the history of world music, and performance venues, and an Institute for the Study of the Mind, Music, and Health. The entire island will become a world art gallery, representing the creativity of all nations. The Well: a spa and wellness center designed to appeal to all cultures.. Theaters: the Imax World Theatre: international cinemas, virtual reality travel extravaganzas and state-of-the art technology. A world sports and recreation center with an emphasis on sportsmanship rather than sports and with facilities especially for the Citys youth. Universe City at Red Hook: A Global Educational Classroom and Campus While the future of our world may rest in the hands of science and technology, its course will be charted by the youth of today and tomorrow. The knowledge and wisdom that we place in their hands will determine the destiny of mankind. Through the demonstration and promotion of tomorrow's technologies, World Island will be able to play a major role in shaping the future, which we will pass to the children of tomorrow while providing a training ground for the youth of today. Developing the 85-acre parcel currently owned by the Port Authority, we will create this educational campus as an extension of the Brooklyn Bridge Park. We propose to house a World High School in Red Hook. An institution dedicated to training the leaders of tomorrow, the World High School will utilize the resources of participating nations to develop an international student body focused on global issues, as well as conventional academic studies, in a politically neutral learning environment. All of

New York City will become a high school campus for the world, with the New York City school system hosting school systems from around the world. The World Island collaboratory will be an incubator for future-oriented programs, including ongoing indoor and outdoor exhibits of agriculture, alternative energy technology, environmental and ecological systems, combined with other scientific advances and the latest technology. Together with its mission to promote world understanding, World Island will also serve world development studies through conferences, seminars, university forums, international fairs and, most important, through world youth development. Commerce and Spirituality on South Island Commerce One World Center: a commercial tower that serves as the commercial office center for the worlds EDCs, international associations, NGOs, philanthropic and many other related international organizations. The World Conference Center: a state-of-the-art facility designed to attract conferences, exhibitions and functions that will be organized and anchored there specifically because of the unparalleled purpose and cultural ecology of the Island. The PAX Pavilion, Planetarium and Eco Center One will be organized in conjunction with the International Institute for Peace through Tourism. At $6 trillion dollars annually, tourism is the worlds largest and fastest growing economic engine. These facilities are dedicated to the advancement of, and education in, the future of tourism. Hotels, corporate retreats, and youth hostel accommodations in a wide variety of structured motifs and creative home settings of all types and sizes. An International Food Festival will add a whole new dimension to New York City, the restaurant capital of the world, with a wide variety of restaurant experiences that will offer cuisines from around the world, catering to every appetite and budget, with a promotional budget that feeds back in to New York City. Spirituality The Island's religious facilities will be open for use by members of all faiths, while community centers and meeting rooms will be available to the city's full complement of social, civic, cultural and fraternal organizations. Center for Corporate Philanthropy: Multinational corporate foundations will form a philanthropic corporate association to educate future leaders in the art and science of giving.

Logistics at Red Hook

Our proposal for Governors Island requires a close interaction with supporting development in the Red Hook area of Brooklyn. Red Hook is a terminus for a tunnel between Governors Island and Brooklyn and, in that capacity, is an essential site for supporting activities: Parking facilities for people transfer from cars and buses to tunnel system transport,

A staging area for conventions and exhibitions, A preparation area for food services, Logistical support and storage for the office, hospitality, retail, and commercial activities, Employee support center Beyond such essential support functions, Red Hook will be a site where we will support and expand the Islands educational programming.

The Peninsula at Bayonne

Roughly two-and-a-half miles Southwest of the Island, the Peninsula at Bayonne also provides feeder and support functions for the Island: bus and auto parking ferry transport cold storage back room and logistics Additionally, it would have a hotel to serve the Island and passengers embarking at Bayonne who wish to combine a trip to the Island with their cruise.

Caravan Communication Network

State of the art broadcast facilities are at the heart of the World Island model. WDEF will build dedicated production facilities on Governors Island, at the Battery Maritime Building, and in Red Hook, with broadcast facilities located in Red Hook. All facilities will be equipped with production and broadcast equipment. These facilities will be used to broadcast educational programming around the world. In serving many world community objectives, the primary purpose of the World Island project is the ageless learning and leadership development of world citizens. Our interactive distance learning system enables everyone of every age, everywhere at any time, especially young people, to experience learning and leadership development. We are in a period of rapid evolution where new career disciplines are essential and where harnessing employment opportunities for managing and governing tomorrow's world are before us. World Island will provide the home of a virtual learning center, to implement a positive guidance methodology to capitalize on new ways for us to interact. Over time it will create a world alumni of future leaders who understand and embrace the practicality of being trustworthy as a core principal in their daily endeavors as private citizens and community leaders. The Caravan Communication Network also plays a key role in the commercial aspects of World Island. World Island will be a premier showcase for products from around the world. The furnishings and appointments throughout the World Island complex will be available for sale in a home shopping venue though broadcast and web media.

Site Constraints and Solutions

In addition to meeting the demands of the above vision, the design will need to address two very critical and negative constraints facing any re-use and re-development of the Island. Without overcoming these constraints, we believe that no proposed development can be economically self-sustaining, and be successful: The lack of convenient, efficient and expedient access to and from the Island which will be open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. The adverse climatic conditions that are typical for a large part of the year.

When fully evolved we project that there will be over 25,000 visitors a day, serviced by over 50,000 employees throughout the facilities in four shifts, seven days a week. The current ferry service must augmented, even then it will not be insufficient to fully meet this demand. Thus we propose to construct a tunnel connecting the Island to lower Manhattan and Red Hook, Brooklyn. This will interface with the existing subway lines in lower Manhattan giving the traveler a convenient and seamless transition. The tunnel system will also serve as one of the ways to transport equipment and supplies from and to Brooklyn. Preliminary studies suggest that an eight-lane people-mover tunnel would have a peak capacity of 30,000 per hour and would allow people to travel between Manhattan and the Island in less than ten minutes. This would solve the access problem both to and from the Island, thus integrating the Island into both Lower Manhattan and Brooklyn. We propose to treat the climate problem with a design that allows for both enclosed ground-level access to the entire southern part of the Island as well as for creating another major feature: a large 28-acre central park (as part of the requirement for 40 acres of park space). Our basic strategy is to construct a four-tier podium on the southern part of the Island with covered connections to the historical district. The bottom tier would extend to the edge of the esplanade on the West, South and East and to Liggett Hall on the North. People would thus be able to move about the southern part of the Island without ever having to leave and enclosed area. The 28acre park would be built on the top-level of this podium, as Chicagos Millennium Park is built above a railroad yard and a parking facility. This tiered campus would also provide space for many of the programming features we envision. The bottom level would house much of the operational infrastructure of the Island (HVAC, utilities, transportation, material distribution, and so forth) while at the same time being a showcase for state-of-the-art technologies. Other levels would house food and beverage venues, retail outlets, galleries, offices, and so forth. The office tower, hotels, conference center and other structures would be constructed on and integrated with this structure.

Economic Significance
As a not-for-profit cultural and educational organization, the WDEF will be in a unique position to preserve the historical character of the Island, while developing

areas of financial support that would not be available to commercial ventures. Revenues derived from all of its programs will be utilized to maintain Governors Island redevelopment, while providing an array of cultural and academic resources. It is important to note that all profits from income generated on the Island, or any of our expansion activities, will be utilized for humanitarian projects. New jobs, record attendance, tourism magnet, new resources, centers of learning, a showcase for enterprise, a place for mentoring global youth, this city, this exciting vista, with a front row seat at the doorstep of the world's greatest city, is a must do, must see experience. The new Governors Island will be an economic powerhouse. With a pledge of support for our WDEF vision and the traditional foresight of City and State leaders eager to advance the city and state agendas for this pioneering endeavor, we will make a striking success out of this rare opportunity to create a stage where great things take place and the unique is commonplace. By enacting this proposal the WDEF will secure a formidable assemblage of creditworthy anchor tenants, including foreign nations, national and international corporate participants and a varied assemblage of high profile interests. Additionally, substantial revenues will be generated through the operation of public facilities, the commanding office tower, the remarkably advanced conference and convention center, world-class hotel accommodations, interesting restaurant fare, and a diverse complement of retail and business related enterprises. At extensive meetings with renowned financial institutions, sincere interest has been expressed by major institutions interested in underwriting a global bond issue as one of our financing strategies. While the world bond is only one of several promising financial initiatives we are pursuing, it provides a characteristic insight into the excitement our plan generates in financial circles. Uncertainties surrounding the New York development environment aside, we are confident in our ability to bring a complete funding solution to the table given the opportunity to present our case to you. It is more than clear that if our proposal is to be realized, it will require extensive private and public sector cooperation, thus realizing the advantage of a working environment within which solutions can be determined and carried out.

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