Race is on to rebuild the heart of Manhattan

War on Terrorism: World Trade Centre

Larry Silverstein, the property developer who paid $3.2bn for the World Trade Centre lease only six weeks before it was destroyed, believes new buildings will begin rising from the ashes within 12 months.

Mr Silverstein, who lost four of his employees in the 11 September disaster, appears to be winning his fight to rebuild on the site despite enormous financial and legal obstacles.

According to The Wall Street Journal, Mr Silverstein, 70, has the support of some of Washington's most influential politicians as well as the rock-steady backing of his financiers and growing approval from George Pataki, the New York Governor.

The developer makes regular visits to the site of the disaster and this week declared himself encouraged by what he saw. "They've made tremendous progress," he said. "I was advised that in 12 months the site should be excavated down to the base and the foundations stabilised ... We could have structural steel coming out of the ground 12 months from today."

Before rebuilding, though, Mr Silverstein must pull together the threads of a hugely complex scheme. First, he must take on his insurers in a legal battle over whether the terrorist assaults on the towers amounted to a single or double event.

If the courts accept his assertion that it was a double event, the insurers must cover the cost of rebuilding each tower; if it was only a single event, the insurance covers only a single building. He must succeed in that battle to secure $3.5bn from each occurrence before he can fund his plans to build four new buildings of about 50 storeys each.

Next, he must gain the approval of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, the agency that owns the site. That is controlled by the governors of the two states, but it has always been assumed that New Jersey will defer to the will of New York, given that that is where the attack took place.

Observers were sceptical at first because Governor Pataki, a Republican, was known to have reservations about Mr Silverstein's financial support for the Democrats. He was also annoyed at the developer's public statements about rebuilding before the Port Authority had decided what to do. Recently, however, there have been signs that Mr Silverstein is winning over the Pataki camp. A spokesman for the Governor said: "[Mr Silverstein] has demonstrated a commitment to New York, and we would expect him to be involved in some fashion."

The financial position also looks promising. The group that backed Mr Silverstein's bid for the 99-year lease was led by the New York investor Lloyd Goldman, and after a meeting of investors this week Mr Goldman announced simply: "We're behind Larry." One of those behind the scheme, Joseph Cayre, an entertainment and real estate mogul, said: "We agreed to do it no matter how much money we have to take out of our pocket. It's become very patriotic, very emotional and very personal for us."