This Freedom Tower Plan Never Got Off the Drawing Board
1980: Sorry, No...
"To many Latins it's the Statue of Liberty of the Southern Hemisphere," asserts reporter Mary Anne Kane near the top of this story. Which is weird, because the Freedom Tower is almost 1,800 miles north of the Equator...Firmly in the Northern Hemisphere.
A new office building proposed to go up fifty feet behind Freedom Tower, according to spokesperson Ana Marie Brechner, will not only have 300,000 square feet of leasable space and parking for 600 cars, but a mirrored facade that will "give a four-dimensional view of the tower from all angles from the boulevard."
"Four-dimensional view?" Is such a thing even possible? Ask a physicist.
Maybe developer Ronald Fine had something unearthly and time-bending in mind when he bought the Freedom Tower for $1,500,00 in 1987, although it looks like he intended to build a new office tower that kept a respectful distance from the historic structure, which held so much meaning for so many in Miami.
In any case, Fine's plans came to nothing. Freedom Tower changed hands many times before being donated to Miami Dade College in 2005.
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This video and audio is copyrighted/owned by the Lynn and Louis Wolfson II Florida Moving Image Archives at Miami Dade College.
This clip is derived from news video in the WTVJ Collection. Accession number TVN0191-799-08; airdate August 7, 1980.