Memorial Jury Gets Community Board 1 Recommendations By Etta Sanders As time draws near for the World Trade Center Memorial Jury to announce a winner, Community Board 1 sent the jury a "short list" of its four recommended plans. They include: Passages of Light: Memorial Cloud, Reflecting Absence, Inversion of Light and Votives in Suspension. The board chose those designs to be the least morbid and the easiest to maintain, as well as providing the most open space and the best access through the site from the rest of the neighborhood. The board also urged the jury to outright reject one design, Suspending Memory, "because the inherent nature of this design renders it incapable of modification such that it would be acceptable." Another design, Garden of Lights, which incorporates lit glass columns requiring 40,000 lights, was also opposed for its resemblance to a cemetery, as well as maintenance concerns. A six-page, strongly worded resolution approved on Dec. 10 by the board's Executive Committee was to be delivered the next day to the Lower Manhattan Development Corp. the next day. The board hopes that the 13-person memorial jury will choose to consider them. The resolution lays out the criteria board members applied in judging the finalists; that the memorial should be integrated into the WTC site as well as the adjacent neighborhoods and that it inspires hope. "We encourage the jury to request the selected designer to consider modifications to look forward, in addition to remembering the past, and to better reflect the spirit of hope." Simplicity and size were also factors. By filling up a 4.7-acre space, the board said, the designs lose focus and impact. Several practical considerations were also spelled out. Pools of water may freeze in the winter. Groves of trees, gardens and prairies may flourish in one season, but wither in another, and all "may be adversely affected by shadows cast by buildings or other elements of the overall design for the WTC site." Here are the board's recommendations and suggestions: " Passages of Light: Memorial Cloud: superior access to and through the site; a good setting for reflection and the most amenable to use as a site for commemoration and celebration of the future; " Reflecting Absence: good access to and through the site; easier to maintain than other designs, although proposed trees would be difficult to grow at the site; proposed building/barrier along West Street is unacceptable, however; " Inversion of Light: green open space is welcome, and has the potential for providing good access to and through the site; programming elements, restricting access to significant portions of the site, are unacceptable; " Votives in Suspension: a good setting for reflection although fuel lights are not acceptable, and significant aesthetic and maintenance issues must be addressed for electric lights; open space is good and design is relatively clean. The board also urged that the memorial incorporate artifacts from the World Trade Center, specifically Fritz Koenig's brass sphere sculpture that stood in the plaza fountain. The damaged sculpture was retrieved from the World Trade Center wreckage and is now part of a temporary memorial in Battery Park. The LMDC has said the jury intends to choose one of the eight finalists by the end of this month. The community board rushed to get its recommendations to the jury, because said chairwoman Madelyn Wills, "the memorial jury is fast tracking."