To accomplish the work of reconstruction and still enable the station to handle its great traffic without serious interruption, serious forethought and definite plans of action were found necessary. The plan was developed by constructing a temporary building of brick and plaster covering a vacant city block in Madison Avenue, at the west of the station. Into this temporary structure a branch post office, an important adjunct of the Grand Central, was moved from the extreme eastern side of the terminal. Excavation for the new terminal began at its eastern edge and at that edge the first portions of the new structure have been completed. A waiting-room was then established in temporary quarters, the last vestiges of the old Grand Central removed, and the main front and centre of the new station fabricated. Similarly, as the excavation has progressed from the east to the west side of the terminal, the great bulk of the traffic has been gradually shifted from the old high-level to the new low-level.
The new Grand Central complete will have its main train-shed devoted to through traffic. A second train-shed of similar arrangement and of slightly smaller dimensions will be constructed underneath the main shed for suburban traffic, and a single head-house will serve both floors. The head-house will have as its chief architectural feature, a concourse of mammoth proportions. The lesser features of the new Grand Central will contribute to make the new terminal, built upon the site of the historic old, one of the world’s greatest gateways. The fact that steam locomotives are absolutely prohibited from entering either of the two new stations on Manhattan Island makes these the cleanest railroad terminals yet built.
So not only have our railroads begun to build great stations; they are to-day building really beautiful stations. An age in which the American demands the exquisite and the monumental in his architecture, palatial homes, palatial shops, palatial hotels, demands that the railroad station be something more than the mere expression of a commercial utility. Stone, the sturdy and durable building material of all the ages, has become the expression of these buildings from without. Within, they are gay with rare marbles and mural paintings. There is nothing too fine for the railroad passenger terminal of to-day in the United States.
When the master fancy of the architect, Richardson, designed the splendid stations at Worcester and Springfield, as well as a host of smaller attractive stations along the line of the Boston & Albany Railroad, the beginnings were made. More recently this rising American desire for beauty and good taste has shown itself in such elaborate and artistic structures as the stations at Albany and Scranton. The last step has come in the designing of the palatial terminals in Chicago, in Washington, and in New York City. It would take a bold prophet to anticipate what the next step might be.
CHAPTER VII
THE FREIGHT TERMINALS AND THE YARDS
Convenience of Having Freight Stations at Several Points in a City—The Pennsylvania Railroad’s Scheme at New York as an Example—Coal Handled Apart from Other Freight—Assorting the Cars—The Transfer House—Charges for the Use of Cars not Promptly Returned to Their Home Roads—The Hard Work of the Yardmaster.
All the folk who come and go upon the railroad know the passenger stations. Few of them know the freight terminals. Yet it is from this last source that the railroad will derive the greater part of its revenue. The freight terminals of a large city will be a group of plants, designed for varying purposes. The railroad handles its passenger business from a single structure, if possible. It is comparatively simple to gather all its passengers, even from a broad territory, within a great city, and so to concentrate this part of its traffic in a single well-located terminal.