NEW YORK, NY August 09, 2002 — City officials sat down with port authority members yesterday for their first face-to-face talks on a city proposal to swap the land under the city's airports for the World Trade Center site. But as WNYC's Andrea Bernstein reports, some civic groups are beginning to wonder if the city can afford the deal.

Bronx cheers greeted the six design plans for the 16-acre plot in Lower Manhattan. "Too commercial" went the reviews. "Too mediocre." The port authority, which owns the land, says its committed to rebuilding all the lost office space in order to maintain its $120 million in annual rent payments from developer Larry Silverstein. So the designs contained proposals for a forest of mid-sized office buildings. Late last week, a new idea began to surface. The city could swap the land under t its airports for the land at ground zero. The New York Times editorial page called it a "win-win-win."

Yaro: It's absolutely worth exploring. It's a brilliant idea

Bob Yaro is President of the Regional Plan Association.

Yaro: It unscrambles the lines of responsibility both at the trade center and also out at the airports.

Under the prpoposal Mayor Bloomberg would have more of a say on the redevelopment of Lower Manhattan. The idea for a land swap was warmly received by the port authority, and Governor Pataki says he's intrigued.

Pataki: We're all in it together. Certainly in that spirit we would look at any proposal the city might make.

But privately, some state officials are irked at the way the city floated the idea, which has been attributed to Deputy Mayor Daniel Doctoroff. The officials wonder why they weren't consulted first, and whether the cash-strapped city could afford the swap. And some civic leaders are beginning to wonder, too.

Bowles: New York City's two airports are enormous cash cows for the city and have the potential to be enormous cash cows for a long time into the future.

Jonathan Bowles is the research director for the center for an urban future. He's says he's long been a supporter of the city havinh more control over the redevelopment of the world trade center site. But he's not sure if the numbers will add up. Right now, the city gets about $3 million a year from the airports now, but the city's long maintained it deserves a lot more. In fact, that's one of the reasons why mayor giuliani threatened to take control of the airports. After the leases expire in 2015, the city wants 60-80 million dollars a year Sources say the city wants about twenty times that amount - plus two thirds of a billion dollars in back rent. But, Bowles says,

Bowles: you know we're also looking at a world trade center site that if the city does what it wants to with that there's going to be far less revenue coming from that site than it has in the past.

Liz Abzug, a co-founder of Rebuild Downtown Our Town, says she also wants a less commercial site.

Abzug: But economically, and at the end of the day when the swap were to occur is it a pretext, because is the city going to have to cede back some power to the state

That's the wrinkle, Abzug says, because if the city gets control of the site, development would be subject to a complicated land use review process. Authorities, including the Lower Manhattan Development corporation, or LMDC, are exempt. So the city might have to turn over the power to the LMDC, meaning it would give up the airports without really getting control of the land. Mayor Bloomberg bristles at all this criticism.

Bloomberg: With the swap there would be lots of changes in regulations, lots of swapping of money streams, lots of agreements so that the city would have some say in how the airports would be run, it is not just a straight land for land deal.

If the deal goes through, the Mayor could claim credit for yet another major restructuring of government. If it fails, it could delay the reconstruction process by several months - or longer. For WNYC, I'm andrea Bernstein.