Posted on: Tuesday, May 28, 2002

Planners steer clear of 9/11 week in N.Y.

By Ted Shaffrey
Associated Press

NEW YORK — The sprawling Jacob K. Javits Convention Center will be all but empty. The banquet rooms at the Waldorf-Astoria hotel won't echo with the usual dinner and speech-making din. And tents for the city's fall fashion shows probably will go up later than normal.

Event calendars are wide open the week of Sept. 11 in New York, as planners have postponed or moved conventions, celebrations and trade shows in deference to the one-year anniversary of the terror attacks against the United States.

"That period this year is very, unusually soft," said Jim Blauvelt, the Waldorf's executive director of catering. "People need that time to reflect and heal."

In years past, the Waldorf was booked that week with United Nations fetes, gala charity balls and fashion week celebrations.

At the Javits Center, the only show scheduled is an international flower exhibition that opens Sept. 12. That's unusual for a venue that is otherwise nearly booked through the end of 2003, spokesman Mike Eisgrau said.

"If somebody wanted to book a show, we would book them," said Eisgrau. But, he said, show management companies are shying away from that week, in which Sept. 11 falls on a Wednesday.

Amy Solomonson, a spokeswoman for NYC & Company, the city's tourism bureau, downplayed the significance of the sparse schedule, attributing it partly to a normal slowdown around the Jewish holidays.

Still, organizers for the Fall Fair for International Fine and Decorative Arts and the Gay Life Expo say they rescheduled their events because of the anniversary.

"We heard that there were memorial events during that time so we called Javits and were able to reschedule for the following week," said Sarah Flynn, director of marketing for Florida-based International Fine Arts Exhibitions.