The sky was the limit.

The emotional load linked for ever to September 11th is such that we overlook the threats of our built environment as if we were obsessed by a high-rise tower urbanism. Most answers to address this risk are biased by current neo-capitalistic paradigms encouraging building as high as possible with no perception of our vulnerability drivers. Enlarging engineered solutions to the question of vulnerability and related disasters is too often based on rationales ignoring that vulnerability is created by our own choices. Theoretical built-in solutions based on redundancy proposals may turn out to be counter-productive, grounded in a technical neutrality, underestimating the intertwined nature of our socio-ecological environment. Addressing the issue of non-resilient systems should not hinder a critical review to know where they originated from.

Twenty years later, we have forgotten that the twin towers we built were easy targets and Ground Zero neighborhood still faces the paradox of ever-growing luxury skyscrapers in a highly vulnerable place. But is it really a paradox?