Mementos of NYC's 'Missing Limb'

Pictures of the old World Trade Center don't need an introduction on this or any other day, but long-time city photographer Steven Siegel certainly deserves one. Siegel has been documenting New York for three decades. Some of his strongest work shows a much grittier New York of the 1980s; earlier this year he told the urban photoblog 12ozProphet that young people "express astonishment" over how much the city has changed:

The word unrecognizable certainly describes the New York found in some of Siegel's pictures of the World Trade Center. In one image that feels like it belongs with out-takes from the original "Planet of the Apes," people have planted themselves on sand dunes in front of the towers as if relaxing on a regular beach. Today the dunes are Battery Park City, and the only time you'll see sand there is when a Corona commercial comes on TV.