THE OCULUS

When visiting the 9/11 Memorial at Ground Zero, visitors will easily see a huge white building with steel wing-shaped spires reaching into the sky. That's Oculus, a transportation and shopping hub built next to One World Trade Center. The structure is one of several that are part of the city's plans to rebuild World Trade Center One after 9/11.

After the horrific attacks of September 11, plans for architectural works were quickly put in place to rebuild and rebuild the World Trade Center. These plans include the idea of ​​a transportation hub to bring businesses and people back to the area - "Oculus." By 2004, construction began and 12 years later, the Oculus was officially opened to the public. A project focused on commerce and the arts, Oculus has become a symbol of the city's strength and a leading beacon of American resilience.

Oculus was designed by Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava. Santiago Calatrava intended it to resemble a dove leaving a child's hand. This image is illustrated throughout the tall, criss-crossing steel columns that create stunning visuals of the interior. Taken together, this series of columns form a pair of wings 350 ft (107m) long. The name "Oculus" comes from the immense strip of windows, or skylights, along the backbone of the roof. "Oculus" in Latin means "eye", in architecture, "eye" refers to a circular structure like an eyeball, with a view that shines directly into the sky.

The view also allows sunlight to flood the Oculus each morning. The corners of the windows are specially arranged to each year on the anniversary of the attacks. At that time, the sun shone directly through the skylight and lit up the main hall at 10:28 am (the time the second tower collapsed). It is called the "Path of Light". Calatrava has positioned the building slightly tilted relative to the street grid to achieve this effect. In addition, Oculus also connects people from all over the city - and around the world. Oculus commuters will find trains leading to New Jersey and across NYC. As expected, the station serves the PATH train, but it also connects directly to more than 10 other metro lines.

The PATH station alone serves more than 250,000 passengers daily.

And Oculus is the third largest transportation hub in NYC.

To show support for One World Trade Center, several high-end stores have opened inside Oculus. Oculus is not only a transportation hub for commuters, but also a massive commercial world. Visitors and residents can buy clothes, fix iPhones, or simply have a delicious meal. At Oculus, there are more than 350,000 square feet (32,520 square meters) of retail stores and catering restaurants only.