From the "Irony Sucks" dept.

[jeriendhal]

I'm re-reading Macaulay's Unbuilding, published in 1980, a fictional account of the dismantling of the Empire State Building, which occurs after an eccentric Saudi prince buys the structure with the intent of moving the whole kit & kaboodle (minus the airship mast, which is a historical landmark) to Saudi Arabia. Macaulay notes that New Yorkers are predictably outraged at the idea, but the clever prince allows for a couple of months pass for the anger to die down and promises to build a park on the old site to display the mooring mast and refit the building's former basement as an annex to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Which leads to the following passsage:

On the brink of defeat, one desperate but clever preservationist suggested that the twin towers of the World Trade Center be offered instead-both for the price of the Empire State. In declining the offer Ali suggested that he would be willing to consider pulling them down as a goodwill gesture. With this final show of generosity all remaining resistance crumbled.
-Unbuilding, page 13

Ouch.