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The World Trade Center Memorial Foundation board has approved a plan for displaying the names of those lost on 9/11 that is both fitting and appropriate - and it did so with a dignity that has oft been lacking in the battles over rebuilding Ground Zero.
Mayor Bloomberg, who became chairman of a troubled panel in October, deserves credit for guiding it to a resolution that addresses concerns raised by families and friends of the terror attack's victims while remaining true to the memorial's design.
The issue that plagued the memorial was whether victims should be identified by workplace. Designer Michael Arad had called for carving the names randomly into parapets surrounding waterfalls that drop into voids where the twin towers had stood. He sought to emphasize the "haphazard brutality" of the attack. But the uniformed services argued for specially recognizing the firefighters and cops who rushed into the doomed buildings. And some families and employers said the memorial should record for history where the victims were, and why.
Bloomberg initially proposed scattering the names of the responders and marking them with the shield of their service. That concept satisfied no one. Now, the names of workers and visitors murdered in the north tower and on the plane that brought it down will be inscribed on the parapet around that building's footprint. The parapet for the south tower will list everyone else who died at the Trade Center, plus the names of all the slain first responders, the people who were killed on the planes that crashed into the Pentagon and in Pennsylvania, and the six people killed in the 1993 WTC bombing.
Civilians will be grouped by place of employment, though their names will be random in the group and the employers won't be specified. Family members will be kept together. First responders will be listed by their command, precinct or company. An elegant solution.
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