90 Church Street is a large United States Postal Service

United States Postal Service

The United States Postal Service is an independent agency of the United States government responsible for providing postal service in the United States...

 office that is responsible for the 10048 (ZIP code)

10048 (ZIP code)

10048 is the zip code assigned to the former World Trade Center in New York City. Years after the September 11 attacks, some mail continues to be sent to 10048 by senders who have not updated their mailing lists...

 in New York City.

History

The Church Street post office and federal building was designed by Louis A. Simon

Louis A. Simon

Louis A. Simon was an American architect.Simon was educated at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Following a tour of Europe, he opened an architectural office in Baltimore, Maryland in 1894....

, who also supervised the construction of the treasury from 1933-1939. The architectural style of the Church Street post office is a mixture of neo-classicism and art deco

Art Deco

Art deco , or deco, is an eclectic artistic and design style that began in Paris in the 1920s and flourished internationally throughout the 1930s, into the World War II era. The style influenced all areas of design, including architecture and interior design, industrial design, fashion and...

 of the New Deal

New Deal

The New Deal was a series of economic programs implemented in the United States between 1933 and 1936. They were passed by the U.S. Congress during the first term of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The programs were Roosevelt's responses to the Great Depression, and focused on what historians call...

 era. It takes up a whole block and has two towers. The fascade is clad in sandstone

Sandstone

Sandstone is a sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized minerals or rock grains.Most sandstone is composed of quartz and/or feldspar because these are the most common minerals in the Earth's crust. Like sand, sandstone may be any colour, but the most common colours are tan, brown, yellow,...

. The building was completed in 1935. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places

National Register of Historic Places

The National Register of Historic Places is the United States government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation...

.

September 11 attacks

The building suffered moderate damage during the September 11 attacks. A remnant of one of the planes and other debris landed on top of the building during the attack. Following the collapse of the World Trade Centers twin towers, damage happened to its facade

Facade

A facade or façade is generally one exterior side of a building, usually, but not always, the front. The word comes from the French language, literally meaning "frontage" or "face"....

, broken windows, and major water damage

Water damage

Water damage describes a large number of possible losses caused by water intruding where it will enable attack of a material or system by destructive processes such as rotting of wood, growth, rusting of steel, de-laminating of materials such as plywood , and many, many others.The damage may be...

. It was also extensively contaminated

Contamination

Contamination is the presence of a minor and unwanted constituent in material, physical body, natural environment, at a workplace, etc.-Specifics:"Contamination" also has more specific meanings in science:...

 with asbestos

Asbestos

Asbestos is a set of six naturally occurring silicate minerals used commercially for their desirable physical properties. They all have in common their eponymous, asbestiform habit: long, thin fibrous crystals...

, lead

Lead

Lead is a main-group element in the carbon group with the symbol Pb and atomic number 82. Lead is a soft, malleable poor metal. It is also counted as one of the heavy metals. Metallic lead has a bluish-white color after being freshly cut, but it soon tarnishes to a dull grayish color when exposed...

 dust, fungi, fiberglass

Fiberglass

Glass fiber is a material consisting of numerous extremely fine fibers of glass.Glassmakers throughout history have experimented with glass fibers, but mass manufacture of glass fiber was only made possible with the invention of finer machine tooling...

 dust, mercury

Mercury (element)

Mercury is a chemical element with the symbol Hg and atomic number 80. It is also known as quicksilver or hydrargyrum...

, and bacteria

Bacteria

Bacteria are a large domain of prokaryotic microorganisms. Typically a few micrometres in length, bacteria have a wide range of shapes, ranging from spheres to rods and spirals...

. There was no major structural damage. During recovery efforts

Rescue and recovery effort after the September 11, 2001 attacks

The rescue and recovery effort after the September 11 attacks comprised the local, state and federal agency reaction to the September 11 attacks. The unprecedented events of that day elicited the largest response of local emergency and rescue personnel to assist in the evacuation of the two towers...

 at Ground Zero, the United States Postal Service worked to return individual pieces of mail found by rescue workers to the addressees.

In August 2004, the Church Street Station Post Office reopened, and mail is once again being processed there. Church Street Station also serves the 10007 zip code, covering portions of Battery Park City

Battery Park City, Manhattan

Battery Park City is a planned community at the southwestern tip of lower Manhattan in New York City, United States. The land upon which it stands was created by land reclamation on the Hudson River using 1.2 million cubic yards of soil and rocks excavated during the construction of the World...

, TriBeCa

TriBeCa

Tribeca is a neighborhood in Lower Manhattan, New York in the United States. Its name is an acronym based on the words "Triangle below Canal Street", and is properly bounded by Canal Street, West Street, Broadway, and Vesey Street...

, and the area surrounding New York City Hall

New York City Hall

New York City Hall is located at the center of City Hall Park in the Civic Center area of Lower Manhattan, New York City, USA, between Broadway, Park Row, and Chambers Street. The building is the oldest City Hall in the United States that still houses its original governmental functions, such as...

. The Church Street Station Post Office is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. In addition to housing the Postal Service, the 90 Church Street building contains offices of the New York State Public Service Commission, New York State Health Department, and New York City Housing Authority

New York City Housing Authority

The New York City Housing Authority provides public housing for low- and moderate-income residents throughout the five boroughs of New York City. NYCHA also administers a citywide Section 8 Leased Housing Program in rental apartments...

.