The $32 Ticket to World Trade Center is Based on Hidden Calculations

Beginning today, it will cost $32 to travel up to the new observation deck at the top of the iconic One World Trade Center. That much is clear.

Much less clear: whether that’s a good, or fair, deal. The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey says only it will earn an expected $875 million over the next 15 years from renting the Ob-Deck, as it’s called. But how it arrived at that figure is shrouded in darkness. Literally.

A lease made public by the Port Authority, pursuant to a freedom of information request, has every single lease term blacked out. This despite the obvious public interest in the details of the deal. 

That interest was piqued even further last winter, when New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, who runs the Port Authority with New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, was seen conspicuously hugging Jerry Jones, the owner of the Dallas Cowboys. Jones, who co-runs Legends One World Observatory provided free trips to Christie and his family to watch the football team from his owner's box. The other co-owner is the Yankees, whose president Randy Levine has ties to Governor Cuomo.

Then there was the unusual announcement of the lease deal, provided by a March 19, 2013, press release by both governors even before the Port Authority board had approved the lease.

This too, might have gone unnoticed, had not an orange-sweater wearing Christie given that ecstatic, nationally-televised hug to Jerry Jones.

The hug went viral just a couple of weeks after Cuomo and Christie vetoed a Port Authority reform bill, passed unanimously by two houses of two legislatures in New York and New Jersey that would have provided more transparency. The governors vetoed the reform bill on the Saturday night between Christmas and New Year’s.

Since then, the Port Authority, under Chairman John Degnan, a Christie appointee, has been noticeably quicker and more forthcoming in its response to freedom of information requests. But on Legends, it’s not budging, citing “trade secrets” and “proprietary commercial and financial information.” This, despite the fact that it’s a singular property in a public location.

So for now, visitors can take the elevator to the top of the tallest building in the western hemisphere, and see almost forever. Except inside the inner workings of the Port Authority, and the two governors that run it.