The project is designed in-house by the Port Authority, and it replaces the original station dating to 1936. Among the advantages is a longer platform, which will accommodate 10-car trains, instead of the typical eight-car models, helping to ease crowding as the corridor grows more popular—Jersey City, anyone? The project will cost $256 million

“The replacement of the aging PATH station at Harrison, along with the addition of 340 new rail cars, demonstrates the Board of Commissioners’ commitment to modernize the PATH system for the 76 million riders who use it each year,” said Port Authority Chairman David Samson. “The new station will be a centerpiece for Harrison’s revitalization and create over a thousand jobs and $344 million in economic activity.”

mchaban [at] observer.com | @MC_NYC

In New York's 13th congressional district, the often-overlooked Democrat Stephen Harrison is challenging Vito Fossella, and with basically no support from the state or national parties, Harrison may have a shot at breaking 41percent.

It would be the most any Democratic challenger has gotten against Fossella. So at the very least, he'd be able to make the case for being the guy again in 2008.

-- Azi Paybarah

So how much impact will the Times endorsement of Democratic challenger Stephen Harrison over Rep. Vito Fossella actually have?

On one hand, the language of the endorsement could hardly have been stronger.

"Mr. Fossella has offered only lame excuses for improperly using his campaign funds for skiing holidays in Vail (including lessons and equipment), as well as vacations in Florida," the Times wrote. Harrison, by contrast, has a "good command of the issues" and "keen intelligence," according to the Times.

On the other hand, it was hardly the sort of surprising development likely to shake up this race, which hasn't been competitive enough to merit much in the way of public polling. As one consultant I talked to noted, "Anybody who listens to the Times wasn't voting for Fossella anyway."

Fossella, for his part, seems to agree: He didn't show up for the editorial board meeting.

-- Azi Paybarah

Vito Fossella, the city's only Republican congressman, has agreed to four debates with his Democratic challenger, Stephen Harrison. Or so Harrison told me.

It hardly means that this contest is suddenly a toss-up. But the very least, it should make Harrison's existence a little harder to forget.

-- Azi Paybarah

This afternoon, I'll be interviewing the slightly out-of focus-guy standing next to Hillary Clinton: Stephen Harrison, a Democrat running in New York's 13th Congressional district against the city's only Republican congressman, Vito Fossella.

Despite some interesting sub-plots -- inappropriate use of an Elmo picture! -- and an anti-incumbent, anti-Republican mood that, at least in theory, makes this a competitive race, we haven't exactly been obsessing over the contest. (Something that hasn't escaped the attention of at least one anti-Fossella blogger.)

If there's anything any of you are curious to hear about from Harrison, email me your questions. Or just drop them in the comments section.

-- Azi Paybarah

The Harrison looks like a clubby Upper East Side American bistro transplanted to the dusky fringe of Tribeca: dark wood, a burnished walnut bar, cream-colored wainscoting, hammered-tin lanterns and candles galore. Even the conservatively attired patrons appear to come from uptown ZIP codes.

Three and a half years old, the Harrison is the second collaboration of Danny Abrams and Jimmy Bradley, whose stable also includes the Red Cat, the Mermaid Inn and, most recently, Pace, on nearby Hudson Street. The food at the Harrison has always been good; however, it reached a peak last fall when the restaurant brought on board 36-year-old Brian Bistrong, whose résumé includes two years at Les-pinasse, seven years at Bouley, and the former Citarella (now called Josephs). Befitting this unaffected setting, his contemporary American cooking is inventive yet accessible, and with a clarity of flavors that never leaves the diner bewildered.

Virtually everything on the menu looks appealing. I rarely order quail as an appetizer, because it requires a lot of drilling for a thin vein of gold. Having seen one served to an adjacent table, however, I decided to give it a try. Partially deboned and splayed on the plate for easy cutting, it was roasted to golden crispness and boosted by a tamarind-tinged carrot "stew" flavored with cashew butter.

An example of the chef's winning restraint is a homemade ricotta cavatelli-the cheese is part of the dough-swathed in a vibrant mélange of bitter greens and a touch of tomato, and holding succulent shards of rabbit. A foamy horse-radish sauce did wonders for a duo of bulky sea scallops, paired with a warm potato salad.

Even the ubiquitous fried calamari gets an uplifting treatment. Perfectly fried, the little pinkie rings are arranged over an invigorating combination of chopped parsley, chives, piquillo peppers and salty serrano ham. One of the more winsome dishes (and not among my favorites) is a play on biscuits and gravy, in which scallion-laced Southern biscuits are ringed by three types of clams-razor, Manila and Wellfleets-all adrift on a clam-juice velouté that was somewhat overshadowed by salty slivers of chorizo.

While the dining room can be crowded and cacophonous, the servers, donning preppy blue-checked shirts and ties, are sharp and professional, even when it comes to wine.

The international wine selection is organized by characteristics-light, medium-bodied and full-and quality bottles abound in all price ranges. Two exceptional inexpensive choices are the white 2003 AZ pinot gris, from the Willamette Valley in Oregon ($29); and, in red, the 2000 Meix Foulot Mercurey, 1er Cru, Cote Chalonnaise ($27).

Seafood is the strong card among main courses. A thick plank of pan-roasted fluke is enlivened with a zesty mustard sabayon and a bittersweet reduction of browned onions, vermouth and chicken stock. If you aren't among the legions of anchovy-phobes, a subtle and mildly salty white anchovy sauce brings to life a beautiful fillet of grilled striped bass. Another uncommon combination-cod and braised red cabbage-sounded improbable, and while it was less combative than I had expected, the dish would have been fine with only its warm hazelnut dressing, toasted hazelnuts and crosnes (similar to Jerusalem artichokes).

Calf's liver aficionados would be delighted with this rendition, served with a sweet sherry reduction and a terrific bacon and onion torta. An excellent quality free-range chicken, firm and meaty, is perfectly roasted and served in a faintly sharp paprika sauce, Brussels sprouts and chestnut stuffing. Vegetables are à la carte, and I can recommend the heady leek and mushroom risotto and herbed spaetzle.

Pastry chef Jeff Gerace turns out a patriotic assembly of fine desserts like banana cream pie, apple and cranberry crisp, and devil's food cake. Also outstanding was the meyer lemon meringue pie with an intriguing lemon-thyme sabayon and candied kumquats. And if the chocolate mousse layered devil's food cake weren't swoony enough, the superb coffee ice cream, velvety and rich, packs enough caffeine to energize a fleet of cabbies.

The first thing I noticed when I walked in was a broken plate, hanging in pieces on the wall in a frame next to the reservations desk. It wasn’t like the crockery that tourists smash in Greek restaurants after a few glasses of ouzo. This was a work of art: a neoclassic female nude peacefully reclining on a bed of clouds, encircled by a yellow-and-black-striped rim and the name “Donatella” scrawled on one of the shards.

The mysterious Donatella was discovered in a flea market by Jimmy Bradley, one of Pace’s owners, who recognized it as the work of the modernist Italian architect and designer Gio Ponti, painted in the 1930’s. The plate is intended to reflect the crumbling beauty of the interior of the restaurant, designed by Jim Walrod, which is on the ground floor and basement of a 19th-century building that was once a produce market.

Pace feels like a very old trattoria in Rome. A “distressed” mirror the size of a vast wall separates the bar from the dining room. It’s been treated with acid and etched with drawings of ancient Rome (“The work of a single diamond,” murmured my companion as we walked in). These images cover the mural on the walls of the dining room too, which are lined with scuffed, torched wooden molding and tungsten sconces. The ceiling looks like weather-beaten leather, aged by decades of pipe and cigarette smoke. From the center hangs an enormous, ugly, wrought-iron chandelier bedecked with green and yellow glass globes—just waiting for some neat swordsmanship by Errol Flynn.

Mr. Bradley and his partner, Danny Abrams, also own the Red Cat (a Chelsea art-world bistro), the Harrison in Tribeca and the Mermaid Inn, a fish “shack” in the East Village. I’ve always liked their restaurants, even if they’re loud. Not only is the food good, the atmosphere is relaxed and cheerful, thanks to the friendly staff.

At Pace, which serves traditional Italian food, the attractive young staff, dressed in white shirts and ties, are not only amenable, they are well versed in the food and wine.

Occasionally when I go to a restaurant, all the dishes on the menu sound so good I want to try everything. Such is the case at Pace. Executive chef Joey Campanaro previously worked at the Harrison, and his menu is constantly changing. Prices are low, too; you can come here just for a sandwich, or a plate of pasta that runs between $10 and $14. And since most of the tables are pretty close together, the sight of your neighbor’s dish may influence your decision. When a wooden platter of glistening salumeria, bresaola, prosciutto and soppressata was set down next-door, I had to order one too, and I wasn’t disappointed.

You can also begin with a choice of “verdure”: juicy marinated mushrooms perked up with a dash of vinegar, red peppers topped with a silver strip of fresh white anchovy, amazing roasted eggplant that has not a trace of bitterness, grilled treviso topped with toasted bread crumbs and hard-boiled egg or cauliflower Sicilian style, with fennel, onion and golden raisins.

One day, grilled sardines were served as a main course with local bass; another day, they appeared with a salad made with white and green beans. Spiedini, skewers of scallops and shrimp in a crisp breading, were also delicious, with a pungent anchovy aioli.

The all-Italian wine list, put together by Peter Botti, is excellent, with a wide range of boutique and vintage wines—and an enthusiastic young sommelier to explain them. One night, I began with a glass of frascati ($8) because I wanted something light, but it received a pasting from my companion, who maintains that this wine always tastes as though ice had been melted into it. I liked it well enough, but his choice of a fruitier Venetian ribolla was worth the extra three bucks. The Frescobaldi Domino 2000 we went on to afterward was terrific—at only $49 a bottle.

As we were waiting for our main course, the men in shirttails were joined by some women friends. Among them stood a tanned, lanky blonde sporting a white miniskirt embossed with the designer’s initials so that it looked like a hand towel from a hotel. She was introduced to the rest of the table without once removing the cell phone from her ear.

“It’s the new etiquette to be on your cell phone while you’re being introduced to people,” said my companion. I pointed out that although he wasn’t on a cell phone, he was wearing his shirt untucked.

“Yes, but just so you know, mine has square corners.”

Mr. Campanaro’s pasta dishes are worthy of a top-notch trattoria in Rome. Spaghettini is cooked al dente and tossed with anchovies, hot peppers and bread crumbs. Squares of agnolotti are filled with pork and veal and served with lemon, sage and parmesan. The lemon is the secret ingredient.

It’s daring to serve pork liver in a New York restaurant. Our waiter recommended it, but I don’t think I’ll try this dish again. The liver was grilled a little too long, so it was rather dry, but it came with very good fried potatoes laced with pieces of crisp bacon, and pleasantly bitter mustard greens. The veal chop, a whopping steakhouse price of $40, was not as generous as it should be for that amount and was overwhelmed by balsamic vinegar in the sauce. But the cod was outstanding, soft and flaky, served with puffs of salt cod potato fritters and warm red pepper salad.

Larissa Raphael’s simple but stellar desserts include a wonderful, flaky pear “pizzette” tart with ice cream, and panna cotta scented with thyme and served with peaches and raspberries. A fragrant strawberry granita is served in a glass like a sundae, layered with anise mousse and almonds. The hazelnut chocolate cake, melting inside a crusty shell, comes with a creamy chocolate gelato and chocolate sauce.

The bill arrives tucked inside an Italian novel. Ours was called L’Assicuratore ( The Insurance Agent), by Lucio Mastronardi. Not a compelling title, but if only one had been around before the Donatello was dropped, perhaps Gio Ponti’s plate wouldn’t have ended up on the wall of this quirky, delightful new restaurant.

Pace **

121 Hudson Street(At N. Moore) 212-965-9500

dress: Casual

noise level: High but not unbearable

wine list: Italian, many interesting regional and boutique wines, fair prices

credit cards: All major

price range: Main courses, $11 to $40

dinner: Monday to Saturday, 5:30 to 11:30 p.m.; Sunday, 5 to 10 p.m. * good ** very good *** excellent **** outstanding

no star poor

The Mermaid Inn Beckons

The closest thing to a lobster roll that you can get in the part of southwestern England I'm writing from is a sausage roll. The medieval market town of Marlborough in Wiltshire is not near the sea-it's surrounded by cornfields slashed with crop circles, rolling hills carved with prehistoric white horses, and giant stones that were hauled here thousands of years ago, God knows how or why. But instead of pondering the mysteries of this glorious landscape, I'm thinking about the Mermaid Inn.

The Mermaid Inn's lobster roll is made with a toasted and buttered brioche instead of a hot-dog bun, and filled with chunks of freshly cooked lobster mixed with a homemade mayonnaise and seasoned with diced red onion, celery, chives and cracked white pepper. Purists, sneer all you like-this is a great sandwich! Until this seafood bistro opened three months ago in the East Village, the closest thing the neighborhood had to a lobster roll was a knish.

The lobster roll is just one of the simple dishes Mermaid Inn does impeccably well. Their menu is not fancy. The seafood, reflecting influences from the North Atlantic and the Mediterranean, is classic and accessible: fried oysters and clams, fresh sardines, seared sea scallops and a nice piece of cod that makes its appearance at your table looking like what it is-a piece of cod, not a piece of sculpture.

The restaurant is a casual, neighborly place owned by Jimmy Bradley and Danny Abrams, the partners behind the Red Cat in Chelsea and the Harrison in Tribeca, and the chef is Mike Price, who was sous-chef at the Harrison.

The décor could not be less Lower East Side. The place looks more like an upmarket seafood shack in Maine or a restaurant in the Hamptons, even though the view from its white mullion windows is not of the harbor, but the street. The front section is done up in black and white, with a bar on one side and maritime charts on the wall, along with a photograph of the Kennedys stepping into a boat at Hyannisport. There's a small raw bar at the entrance and dozens of oysters from the East and West coasts. Past the crowded bar, the "head" and the kitchen (where dishes are piling up in the window), you come to a dining room that looks like a tavern and has a small garden in the back. There are exposed brick walls and weathered beams, porcelain lamps and plain wooden tables set with candles. It's noisy, and the hardwood floor does a good job of keeping up the decibel level. If you don't want to wait for your own table, you can opt to sit at the communal one in the center. It's so loud you won't be able to hear a word anyone else is saying, and there's no danger of their hearing you.

Mermaid Inn doesn't take reservations (except for parties of six to eight), so when you walk in, the hostess puts your name on a list and suggests that you have a drink at the bar. The inconvenience of this is lessened by the appearance of Ivan, a tall, handsome and exceedingly charming bartender. "Very dangerous," said one of my friends, who was a little put out when we were seated quite quickly and she couldn't linger at the bar with her wine. "I could have just leaned over and kissed him!"

Instead, she ordered a plate of Prince Edward Island oysters with a chili lime mignonette. The chef describes this wonderful concoction as a gazpacho of sorts; he makes a purée of tomato, jalapeno, cucumber, red onion and cilantro and hangs it in cheese cloth (rather like David Bouley's famous clear tomato soup) so the juice collects in a bowl underneath. He mixes the juice with champagne and rice vinegars, lemon juice, chopped peppers and cilantro. It's spicy yet delicate, one of the few mignonette sauces that I really liked, giving the oysters a subtle kick without overwhelming them.

Spanish gazpacho also provides the inspiration for the skate, which is seared crisp and served on frisée and comes with a refreshing chilled mix of grapes, almonds, cucumber and red onion, chopped up with bread soaked in milk.

Clam fritters are made with savory cake batter mixed with minced clams and seasoned with beer, clam juice and onion. They're a little bready but good, and they come with a lively lemon caper aïoli that has a touch of anchovy and red wine. The fried oysters are even better; they arrive at the table very hot, with a Savoy cabbage cole slaw and a pool of tomato butter.

Mr. Price travels to Greece for the salad he serves with plump Portuguese sardines, hoping that people in the East Village will develop a taste for this fish served fresh (many people still seem to think they're born of spontaneous generation in the can). The sardines are arranged on a bed of cucumber, tomato and red onion with feta, black olives and fresh oregano. If you've never discovered fresh sardines, this is the place to start. The barbecued shrimp are also delicious, done like Louisiana blackened fish, tossed with cayenne pepper, paprika and thyme before being grilled and served in a balsamic vinaigrette.

The salmon couldn't be simpler or more summery, served on a bed of toasted corn, Yukon golds and cherry tomatoes with a beurre blanc mixed with fresh basil purée. The diver scallops, which come with braised cabbage laced with bacon and horseradish, are plump and juicy-they're a revelation. And the whole grilled dorade is stuffed with thyme and served over a bed of wilted greens moistened with a shallot vinaigrette. It's as light and simple as you could wish for in the dog days of summer.

The well-chosen wine list offers around 35 bottles, and they're priced at just $15 above wholesale.

There is no dessert menu. Instead, at the end of dinner you get an espresso cup filled with a dark chocolate pudding, and with the bill you get a Chinese fortune-telling fish made of red plastic. The way it curls in your palm indicates whether you are passionate, indifferent or in love. My friend-the one who took to Ivan behind the bar-put it in her palm. "It's a defective fish if it doesn't curl up," she said. It curled. Like everything else at Mermaid Inn, it works.

The Harrison seems to have filled an empty niche in this part of town, where the choice of restaurants (apart from Odeon) veers between the temple of gastronomy, such as Chanterelle or Nobu, and the neighborhood bar. It's a warm, welcoming place, with a clubby, all-American feel and a menu that is straightforward but not boring–and modestly priced.

The proprietors, Jimmy Bradley and Danny Abrams, also own the Red Cat in Chelsea, where they've built a devoted following. Before opening the Red Cat back in 1999, they polled the neighborhood–which now boasts over 60 art galleries–to find out what their prospective customers wanted to eat. The answer was not cutting-edge fusion cuisine, but simple food at reasonable prices. The Red Cat formula worked so well that the owners didn't bother to ask the residents of Tribeca what they'd like. And the success of their new restaurant, as I had discovered, was immediate.

The Harrison is every bit as noisy as the Red Cat, especially if you sit along the row of banquettes that divide the dining room from the bar. Perhaps the horrible screeching laugh from the next table did not come from the same woman who had wrecked a pleasant dinner at the Red Cat a couple years ago, but I felt I was reliving the experience at the Harrison as shrill cries of "Oh, my Gaaaaawwwd !" punctuated the din and the woman's friends egged her on with loud guffaws. Why didn't they talk about something gloomy to shut her up? I wondered.

The restaurant has taken over the space that formerly housed Spartina, an Italian trattoria. The airy dining room, which seats 90, has French doors on two sides that will open onto the street in warm weather, adding another 45 outdoor seats. The décor is not whimsical like the Red Cat, but plain, even anonymous, with white wainscoted walls, a wood floor and brown leather banquettes. The ceilings are hung with those metal chandeliers topped with little parchment shades that you see in family restaurants. The long bar, made of black walnut, is behind a room divider made of walnut columns bound with strips of steel. I'm told that the Harrison is a hot spot for people in fashion, but unless the open-necked blue shirt or the baggy black sweater is the new look, the customers I saw were dressed as if they hadn't spent a great deal of time thinking about their clothes, let alone "canoodling" in restaurants. Many of them had probably strolled over from the high-rise apartment buildings across Greenwich Street.

Much has been written about comfort food these days. The term seems to refer to dishes such as macaroni and cheese or meatloaf. Actually, I think what comforts people is crunchy food, and there's a lot of it on the Harrison's menu–from the spicy house French fries to the crusted artichokes served in a huge bowl of greens in a lemon Parmesan froth. This crunchy food is one of the keys to the restaurant's success.

The cooking is American with a bold Mediterranean streak. Chef Joseph Campanaro collaborated with Mr. Bradley (with whom he used to work at the Bryant Park Grill) on the menu, which reflects their shared Italian background. Even the plump grilled sardines were crunchy, but moist under their puffed-up skin; they were served with a chick-pea salad and crumbled feta. Sweetbreads done like saltimbocca was a nice idea. They were wrapped in a layer of seared pancetta, but the bacon rather overwhelmed the delicacy of the sweetbreads, which were served with chanterelles and a Marsala wine sauce. Fried clams were simply great, light and greaseless, and came with a terrific lemon-coriander aioli. It was impossible to stop eating them. Raw sushi-grade tuna was good, too, cut in thick slabs and served with a salad of cucumber, radish and red onion, with parsley and champagne vinegar and a gazpacho sauce.

Skate was shaped like a horseshoe and arrived with a skin so crispy you'd almost think it had been deep-fried. Ruby grapefruit, large cracked green olives, frisée and red onion slices completed the dish, which was served with a citrus emulsion made with grapefruit juice, white wine, butter and chives. But the combination didn't hang together and the skate was stringy; I would rather have had it the old way, with capers and black butter. The cod, on the other hand, was wonderful, with melted leeks and shiitakes in a delicate porcini broth.

I don't think I've ever had better calf's liver than the version served at the Harrison. Under a sherry glaze, it was as creamy and melting as foie gras and was served with a layered bacon-onion "torta." The grilled pork chop was a bit tough and underseasoned. It was accompanied by a hefty portion of toasted orzo with stewed tomato and calamata olives. The pan-crisped chicken could have done with more salt, too, but it had a lovely crisp exterior and was served with a bracing lemon-mustard sauce. A side order of tiny Brussels sprouts, pan-fried and served with maple candied pecans just like a Thanksgiving dish, went nicely, as did the lemon-garlic broccoli rabe. Slow-roasted monkfish was, well, monkfish–poor man's lobster, and it's never done much for me. Here the chef had made a valiant effort to make it taste of something other than a wet pillow: He had perked it up with a pancetta brown butter and served it with a spinach risotto that could have stayed a few more minutes on the fire.

Pastry chef Fred Miller, formerly of Daniel, turns out terrific desserts with an American slant. The crunchy lemon-blueberry shortcake with frozen lemon mousse and crème fraîche was great (who cared if the berries were out of season?), as was the quince and apple crisp with ginger ice cream. The chocolate-mousse cake with caramel and the pumpkin tart with praline sauce were also very good, as was the elegant pistachio financier with roasted pears.

The Harrison is an unpretentious, friendly place. It's not hard to understand why it's been packed since it opened. Just walk out and look at the eerie bright lights from ground zero, a few blocks away, and it makes sense.

the harrison

[ [

355 Greenwich Street

274-9310

dress: Casual

noise level: High

wine list: 250-bottle list, international and reasonably priced with many out-of-the-ordinary selections

credit cards: All major

price range: Main courses, lunch, $9 to $18; dinner, $17 to $28

lunch: Monday to Friday, noon to 2:30 p.m.

dinner: Monday to Thursday, 5:30 p.m. to 11 p.m.; Friday and Saturday, to 11:30 p.m.

[ good

[ [ very good

[ [ [ excellent

[ [ [ [ outstanding

no star poor

"The pork tenderloin is not organic, not free-range. It comes from Iowa," said the restaurant's chef and co-owner, Jimmy Bradley, standing beneath an iron chandelier with a burned-out bulb. "The menu should be exciting. Once you get used to it, once you learn everything on here, it's going to change. We want to surprise people." He went on to give the finer points of sautéed sweetbreads saltimbocca and homemade bresaola with petit taleggio fettunta and fig syrup. Opening night will be on Oct. 22-pushed back from the original opening date of Sept. 17.

The dark-haired, baby-faced Mr. Bradley, 34, and his business partner, Danny Abrams, 40, say that they like opening in what they call "non-convenience-oriented" neighborhoods. In 1999, when they opened the Red Cat restaurant in forsaken West Chelsea, on 10th Avenue and 24th Street, art galleries were only beginning to trickle in. Today, walk-ins to the Red Cat are told with a smile that there's a one-hour wait.

Tribeca, post–Sept. 11, presents a thornier challenge.

"This is a proven restaurant destination, with a high concentration of two- and three-star restaurants," said Mr. Abrams, a bouncy man with bleached-blond hair and wire-rim glasses, who handles the front of the house at the Red Cat. "We want to be a neighborhood restaurant with world-class aspirations."

"We want to offer the hospitality of the Red Cat," said Mr. Bradley. "It's a much more true sense of hospitality. It's not about who the designer is, it's not about the location of the restaurant, it's not about a name chef. It's about how you make people feel."

Their corner space on Greenwich Street and Harrison Street, which was occupied by Spartina until April, is not, at first glance, a location that stirs up good feelings. Looking out from the French doors, you can see river barges piled with debris from the World Trade Center. Looking south down eerily empty Greenwich Street, you're confronted by the charred carapace of the World Trade Center's Building 5. Unless the winds are favorable, the air still carries the strong burning smell that has haunted Manhattan and Brooklyn for weeks. Police officers zip past in golf carts; National Guardsmen patrol a barricade on Chambers Street.

"You know, it's surprisingly pleasant here," Mr. Bradley said, his voice rising as he turned to look out the window.

One can argue that, by opening a restaurant adjacent to a war zone, Mr. Bradley and Mr. Adams will earn a fierce loyalty from Tribeca residents.

"People tell us, 'We're really glad you're opening,'" said Mr. Abrams. "It's a sign that life goes on. At the meeting for the Tribeca Organization, people told us, 'Get open. We'll support you.'

"We have a great base" at the Red Cat, he added. "Regulars there are unbelievable. They tell us, 'We'll bring five, eight people down to support you.'"

But will that be enough to make up for the loss of what would have been a pool of tens of thousands of hungry office workers from the surrounding area?

"Tribeca lost its prime customer base" in the attacks, said Tim Zagat, whose 2002 Zagat Survey, published this week, reports the closing of 30 restaurants in the vicinity of the disaster site. "They lost 55,000 people in the World Trade Center, 25,000 in the World Financial Center-it's like losing the town next door. It's rough. Only Monday did the Holland Tunnel reopen. [Restaurants in Tribeca] have had phone problems, so that people didn't know that they were open. And if that wasn't bad enough, there's still smoke. It's not very appetizing."

Local restaurateurs are overwhelmingly supportive of the Harrison.

"I think it's fabulous," said Karen Waltuck, co-owner of Le Zinc and the three-star Chanterelle down the block, which is now offering a $35 prix-fixe dinner and $20 lunch in addition to their $84 menu. "We're feeling this amazing support of people coming downtown. The energy has been so wonderful. [The Harrison opening] just adds to it."

"It's fantastic. It'll take some time, and they've already spent the money," said Edward Youkilis, former manager of the Odeon, who's planning to reopen Bar Odeon on Oct. 19 under a new name. "It's a little nutty right now-there's a helicopter hovering over the Odeon-but things are not as bad as they could be." Asked about the timing of his own venture, he said, "I'm not nervous. It will cater to the neighborhood with simple food and prices. People will always want a burger and a beer."

The interior of the Harrison is fairly basic. The dining room, which seats 100, has dark wood floors, white wainscoting and iron chandeliers with parchment shades. A French cobbler's table makes up part of the bar. Downstairs, there's a private dining room and wine cellar that can double as a screening room (Miramax is a block away). The Mediterranean menu will have entrees averaging a gentle $19. Mr. Bradley said they need to make $3,000 a day to break even, which means that, at an average of $45 per person, they need to draw at least 70 people a day.

On the morning of Sept. 11, construction was in full swing. "We were in the final push," said Mr. Bradley. "We'd been there seven days a week for four weeks. Our crews saw both planes hit. The Chinese guys were working outside. They ran."

"I didn't think about the business for days," said Mr. Abrams.

"We had two thoughts: open when we can, or open in the spring," said Mr. Bradley.

"It's hard to have a restaurant when people have to go through checkpoints and show ID to get there," said Mr. Abrams. "How would we get supplies? It was day-to-day for three weeks."

They decided that since they wanted to be a neighborhood restaurant, what better way to win their new neighbors' hearts than to feed them lamb's tongue Piedmontese with Barolo sauce in their time of need? And they'd already put $1 million of their own money (they have only one other investor) into the space, for which they have a 10-year lease.

So on Oct. 2, they set a new opening date. Immediately following the attacks, since the staff of waiters, cooks and busboys was already being paid, Mr. Bradley sent them out for 12-hour shifts on a Spirit Cruise ship that was bringing food down to rescue workers. "I told them, 'You're doing whatever the fuck the guy on the boat tells you to do,'" he said, laughing.

None of the 47 employees have quit. One of the waiters, Gerad Argeros, a 30-year-old filmmaker, said, "When you hear people are leaving the city in droves and buying gas masks, to have people like Jimmy and Danny saying, 'We're going to build a place in the neighborhood that people are going to fall in love with'-it's amazing. Maybe it's brave to come down here. I feel like I'm doing something smart. I wanna ride the wave."

The Tribeca scene was looking bright on Oct. 11, when a citywide benefit for workers at the Windows on the World restaurant, which had been located on the 106th floor of Tower 1, filled tables at several local restaurants. At Odeon, a neighborhood standby for 21 years, there was a celebrity-packed party to boost support for the neighborhood. "A lot of people told me, 'I didn't know it was open down here,'" said Odeon's general manager, Steven Abromowitz. "They asked me if it was the reopening party, but we opened a week after" the attacks.

Restaurant Week, which runs Oct. 15 to Oct. 19 and offers three-course lunches for $20.01 at places like Chanterelle and Nobu, is also expected to bring New Yorkers back downtown.

"It's a funny situation to be in, to be told that it's your community duty to eat a meal," said Tribeca-based architect and writer James Sanders.

But few Tribeca restaurants can survive on the patronage of the locals alone, and a patriotic burst of uptowners dipping below Canal Street will only last so long. It is rather Mr. Bradley's reputation as a rising chef, and Mr. Abrams' skills as an easygoing host, upon which the Harrison's future depends.

"Their timing was good, up until the moment when something happened that they had no control over," said Drew Nieporent, who closed the kitchens of his own Tribeca empire (including Nobu, Tribeca Grill and Montrachet) in the two weeks after the attack to focus his energy on feeding rescue workers. "Anyone opening anything anywhere in New York isn't going to have the same advantage as before the 11th." But he added of the Harrison: "They're gonna be O.K."

"It's not economics alone that are guiding the current situation, it's not knowing what will be from day to day," said Michael Ginor, president of Hudson Valley Foie Gras. "You might have plans to go out to dinner, and then you hear about anthrax and stay home and order pizza. It's really a very tragic time to open a restaurant. Jimmy Bradley's pedigree is strong. And if any place could succeed, it would be his."