Indio to dedicate 9/11 memorial built around World Trade Center steel on 25th anniversary
INDIO, Calif. (KESQ) A 12-foot steel beam recovered from the World Trade Center is now in place at Miles Avenue Park, and on Friday, the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, Indio will dedicate the memorial built around it.
The ceremony begins at 9 a.m. at the park, 82540 Miles Ave., next to the Coachella Valley History Museum. Mayor Pro Tem Waymond Fermon said the artist and the full City Council are expected to attend. The city has invited residents, neighboring communities and local public safety agencies.
“This is a moment now where our country could pause, really come together and forget our differences and remember the innocent lives that were lost,” Fermon told News Channel 3 at the site Wednesday. “And so that’s what the city of Indio is doing.”
The memorial is the work of artist James Dinh, who submitted his design in 2023. The beam stands in front of a large curved steel wall engraved with “09 11 01” and punched with thousands of tiny holes. Illuminated at night, the holes are meant to look like a constellation of stars, Dinh has said.
“We obtained this piece and we really made it into a circle where we could come together and recognize humanity,” Fermon said.
The project took years to reach this point. The city issued a call for artists in March 2023, describing the centerpiece as a 12-foot steel artifact with a spiral curve from the former World Trade Center, to be used as-is without alterations. On Aug. 16, 2023, the City Council awarded Dinh a $130,000 contract to fabricate and install the sculpture.
The memorial was first planned for the northeast corner of Jackson Street and Dr. Carreon Boulevard, within the city’s Public Safety Campus. The council later directed staff to find a site that could better accommodate public gatherings, and Miles Avenue Park was chosen. A city staff report warned the move might require the artist to rework the design, including the lighting, and estimated the added cost at $20,000 or more beyond the approved $130,000 budget. A final project cost was not immediately available.
Ground was broken on Sept. 11, 2025. At the time, the city said it had been entrusted with the beam four to five years earlier. Details of the transfer were not immediately available.
“I think it’s been in the planning phases for a while,” Fermon said. “We just didn’t have the right time and moment to do it. But we came together as a council and a community to put it in this location where folks could come, go to the park, see this piece of history.”
Nearly 3,000 people were killed in the attacks in New York, at the Pentagon and in a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania. Twenty-five years later, the toll is still rising. The 9/11 Memorial & Museum in New York says more people have now died of Sept. 11-related illnesses than were killed in the attacks, and that about 8,000 people enrolled in the federal World Trade Center Health Program have died, though not every death is tied to a certified 9/11 condition. This year the museum is adding a seventh moment of silence to its ceremony for those who died from health effects of the attacks and their aftermath. As of June 30, the health program was caring for 145,275 responders and survivors, according to its quarterly report.
Fermon said the memorial should speak for them, too.
“All these years later, communities are still suffering from the tragic 9/11 events, and we have to come together and speak for those folks and support them,” he said.
He said the memorial reflects how the city responds when things go wrong, pointing to Tropical Storm Hilary and to earthquakes.
“Indio is a community, it’s a neighborhood, and we always come together at times of tragedy,” Fermon said. “The city of Indio will come together and we will take care of our neighbors.”
The 9/11 memorial will soon have company. Across the park, crews are building a veterans memorial the council approved in April with a $500,000 budget. It will feature seven pillars representing the branches of the U.S. armed forces. City staff said a dedication is planned for November, around Veterans Day.
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