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An open pit, the crucible where the fires burned for weeks after Sept. 11, 2001, and the ground that held most of the bodies of the dead, will stand as the centerpiece of the city's effort to memorialize and rebuild after the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center, under a decision made by city and state officials last night.

The move came yesterday when officials overseeing the rebuilding of Lower Manhattan agreed to hire Studio Daniel Libeskind, the Berlin-based firm whose plan for the site centers on the excavated pit at the trade center, ringed by glass towers that swirl upward to a 1,776-foot spire.

The Libeskind design was considered the front-runner for weeks, although a rival plan by an architecture team called Think, which featured two soaring latticework towers called the World Cultural Center, collected strong support as the decision neared. Ultimately, however, rebuilding officials voted in favor of Mr. Libeskind's somber treatment of the memorial and the incorporation of an active street life in the commercial portions of the site.

While the choice of design made some things clear, battle lines are already being drawn over other issues, from the proposed underground parking garages to an enclosed mall and the amount of commercial office space on the site. It is by no means certain, for example, how the memorial will be paid for, when the commercial buildings will go up, whether the towers will look much like the buildings in the design, or whether the city or the Port Authority will ultimately control the site. [News analysis, Page B6.]

A formal announcement of the decision is expected at 11 a.m. today at a news conference at the World Financial Center's Winter Garden, adjacent to ground zero. The officials who made the decision, including representatives from the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and the offices of Gov. George E. Pataki and Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, declined to comment last night as they left the meeting.

John C. Whitehead, the chairman of the development corporation, called Mr. Libeskind yesterday to inform him of his selection, according to a person present during the conversation. Rafael Viñoly, one of the leaders of the Think team, said in an interview last night that he received a brief telephone call from Alexander Garvin, the lead planner for the development corporation, informing him of the decision.

After months of wrangling over the future of the area known as ground zero, and after three weeks of intense lobbying by the two finalists, the decision last evening was made in a meeting that lasted less than an hour.

The eight members of the steering committee that made the decision met with the architects on Tuesday night to hear about revisions that each had made to their plans to address concerns raised by rebuilding officials. Yesterday, just a few hours before the decision was reached, the architects met with Mr. Pataki and Mr. Bloomberg.

Two people who took part in the steering committee meeting said that both Mr. Pataki and Mr. Bloomberg supported Mr. Libeskind, as did representatives from the Port Authority. Roland W. Betts, the development corporation director who oversaw the site planning effort, supported the Think plan but agreed to the group's consensus.

Two people who took part in the committee's discussion yesterday said Mr. Bloomberg, who earlier this month said he favored Mr. Libeskind's design, was not impressed with the changes made by the Think team, particularly in the ground-level aspects of its design. Throughout the process, city officials have stressed their belief that a plan for the site must contribute to an active street life downtown.

Mr. Pataki has repeatedly said that his focus in the rebuilding process is on the memorial to the victims of the attack, and from the beginning he has said he was moved by Mr. Libeskind's design. Many family members of victims have also favored Mr. Libeskind's preservation of so much of the site, and Mr. Pataki has sided with the desires of family members several times, as when he proclaimed last summer that nothing would be built on the ground where the two towers had stood.