Grand Central Terminal (GCT; also referred to as Grand Central Station or simply as Grand Central), is a commuter rail terminal located at 42nd Street and Park Avenue in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. Grand Central is the southern terminus of the Metro-North Railroad's Harlem, Hudson and New Haven Lines, serving the northern parts of the New York metropolitan area. It also contains a connection to the Long Island Rail Road through the Grand Central Madison station, a 16-acre (65,000 m2) rail terminal underneath the Metro-North station, built from 2007 to 2023. The terminal also connects to the New York City Subway at Grand Central–42nd Street station. The terminal is the third-busiest train station in North America, after New York Penn Station and Toronto Union Station.
The distinctive architecture and interior design of Grand Central Terminal's station house have earned it several landmark designations...Read more
Grand Central Terminal (GCT; also referred to as Grand Central Station or simply as Grand Central), is a commuter rail terminal located at 42nd Street and Park Avenue in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. Grand Central is the southern terminus of the Metro-North Railroad's Harlem, Hudson and New Haven Lines, serving the northern parts of the New York metropolitan area. It also contains a connection to the Long Island Rail Road through the Grand Central Madison station, a 16-acre (65,000 m2) rail terminal underneath the Metro-North station, built from 2007 to 2023. The terminal also connects to the New York City Subway at Grand Central–42nd Street station. The terminal is the third-busiest train station in North America, after New York Penn Station and Toronto Union Station.
The distinctive architecture and interior design of Grand Central Terminal's station house have earned it several landmark designations, including as a National Historic Landmark. Its Beaux-Arts design incorporates numerous works of art. Grand Central Terminal is one of the world's ten most-visited tourist attractions, with 21.6 million visitors in 2018, excluding train and subway passengers. The terminal's Main Concourse is often used as a meeting place, and is especially featured in films and television. Grand Central Terminal contains a variety of stores and food vendors, including upscale restaurants and bars, a food hall, and a grocery marketplace. The building is also noted for its library, event hall, tennis club, control center and offices for the railroad, and sub-basement power station.
Grand Central Terminal was built by and named for the New York Central Railroad; it also served the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad and, later, successors to the New York Central. Opened in 1913, the terminal was built on the site of two similarly named predecessor stations, the first of which dated to 1871. Grand Central Terminal served intercity trains until 1991, when Amtrak began routing its trains through nearby Penn Station.
Grand Central covers 48 acres (19 ha) and has 44 platforms, more than any other railroad station in the world. Its platforms, all below ground, serve 30 tracks on the upper level and 26 on the lower. In total, there are 67 tracks, including a rail yard and sidings; of these, 43 tracks are in use for passenger service, while the remaining two dozen are used to store trains.
Three buildings serving essentially the same function have stood on the current Grand Central Terminal's site.[1]
Predecessors Grand Central DepotGrand Central Terminal arose from a need to build a central station for the Hudson River Railroad, the New York and Harlem Railroad, and the New York and New Haven Railroad in modern-day Midtown Manhattan.[1][2][3] The Harlem Railroad originally ran as a steam railroad on street level along Fourth Avenue (now Park Avenue),[4][5][6][7] while the New Haven Railroad ran along the Harlem's tracks in Manhattan per a trackage agreement.[4][5][6] The business magnate Cornelius Vanderbilt bought the Hudson River and New York Central Railroads in 1867, and merged them two years later.[6][7][8] Vanderbilt developed a proposal to unite the three separate railroads at a single central station, replacing the separate and adjacent stations that created chaos in baggage transfer.[1]
Vanderbilt commissioned John B. Snook to design his new station, dubbed Grand Central Depot, on the site of the 42nd Street depot.[9][10] Construction ran from September 1, 1869, to October 1871.[5] Designed in the Second Empire style,[5][11] the station was considered the country's first to measure up to those in Europe.[12]
Grand Central Station, c. 1902Expansions in 1895 and 1900—the latter coinciding with a renaming to Grand Central Station[13]—could not keep up with the growth in passenger traffic,[14][15] nor could they alleviate the problems of smoke and soot produced by steam locomotives in the Park Avenue Tunnel, the only approach to the station.[16] After a deadly 1902 crash in the smoky tunnel,[17][18][19][20][21] the New York state legislature enacted a ban on steam trains in Manhattan, to begin in 1908.[22] William J. Wilgus, the New York Central's vice president, proposed to tear down Grand Central Station and build a new, larger station with two levels of tracks, all electrified and underground.[23][24][16][17][18][25] The railroad's board of directors approved the $35 million project in June 1903.[18][25]
Replacement Proposal of the associated architects of Grand Central during its construction, 1905The new Grand Central Terminal was to be the biggest terminal in the world, both in the size of the building and in the number of tracks.[13][23][N 1] It was meant to compete with Pennsylvania Station, a majestic electric-train hub being built on Manhattan's west side for arch-rival Pennsylvania Railroad by McKim, Mead & White.[27] New York Central picked the firm of Reed and Stem to handle the overall design of the station, and Warren and Wetmore for the station's Beaux-Arts exterior.[28][29][30]
Terminal and baggage building construction c. 1912Construction on Grand Central Terminal started on June 19, 1903.[31] and proceded in phases to prevent railroad service from being interrupted.[32] About 3.2 million cubic yards (2,400,000 m3) of the ground were excavated at depths of up to 10 floors, with 1,000 cubic yards (760 m3) of debris being removed from the site daily. Over 10,000 workers were assigned to the project.[33][34][35] The total cost of improvements, including electrification and the development of Park Avenue, was estimated at $180 million in 1910.[36] The segments of all three lines running into Grand Central had been electrified by 1907.[35] The last train left Grand Central Station at midnight on June 5, 1910,[37] and the new terminal opened on February 2, 1913.[38][39]
HeydayThe terminal spurred development in the surrounding area, particularly in Terminal City, a commercial and office district created above where the tracks were covered.[40][41][42] The development of Terminal City also included the construction of the Park Avenue Viaduct, surrounding the station, in the 1920s.[43][44][45] The new electric service led to increased development in New York City's suburbs, and passenger traffic on the commuter lines into Grand Central more than doubled in the seven years following the terminal's completion.[46] Passenger traffic grew so rapidly that by 1918, New York Central proposed expanding Grand Central Terminal.[47]
In 1923, the Grand Central Art Galleries opened in the terminal. A year after it opened, the galleries established the Grand Central School of Art, which occupied 7,000 square feet (650 m2) on the seventh floor of the east wing of the terminal.[48][49] The Grand Central School of Art remained in the east wing until 1944,[50] and it moved to the Biltmore Hotel in 1958.[51][N 2]
Decline The MetLife Building was completed in 1963 above part of Grand Central Terminal.In 1947, over 65 million people traveled through Grand Central, an all-time high.[33] The station's decline came soon afterward with the beginning of the Jet Age and the construction of the Interstate Highway System. There were multiple proposals to alter the terminal, including several replacing the station building with a skyscraper; none of the plans were carried out.[53] Though the main building site was not redeveloped, the Pan Am Building (now the MetLife Building) was erected just to the north, opening in 1963.[54]
In 1968, New York Central, facing bankruptcy, merged with the Pennsylvania Railroad to form the Penn Central Railroad. The new corporation proposed to demolish Grand Central Terminal and replace it with a skyscraper, as the Pennsylvania Railroad had done with the original Penn Station in 1963.[55] However, the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission, which had designated Grand Central a city landmark in 1967, refused to consider the plans.[56][57] The resulting lawsuit went to the Supreme Court of the United States, which ruled in favor of the city.[58] After Penn Central went into bankruptcy in 1970, it retained title to Grand Central Terminal.[59] When Penn Central reorganized as American Premier Underwriters (APU) in 1994, it retained ownership of Penn Central. In turn, APU was absorbed by American Financial Group.[60]
The Main Concourse in 1986, featuring the Kodak Colorama, the illuminated clock, and two banksGrand Central and the surrounding neighborhood became dilapidated during the 1970s, and the interior of Grand Central was dominated by huge advertisements, which included the Kodak Colorama photos and the Westclox "Big Ben" clock.[61] In 1975, Donald Trump bought the Commodore Hotel to the east of the terminal for $10 million and then worked out a deal with Jay Pritzker to transform it into one of the first Grand Hyatt hotels.[62] Grand Central Terminal was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1975 and declared a National Historic Landmark in the following year.[63][64][65] This period was marked by a bombing on September 10, 1976, when a group of Croatian nationalists planted a bomb in a coin locker at Grand Central Terminal and hijacked a plane; the bomb exploded while being disarmed and injured three NYPD officers and killed one bomb squad specialist.[66][67]
The terminal was used for intercity transit until 1991. Amtrak, the national rail system formed in 1971, ran its last train from Grand Central on April 6, 1991, upon the completion of the Empire Connection on Manhattan's West Side. The connection allowed trains using the Empire Corridor from Albany, Toronto, and Montreal to use Penn Station.[68] However, some Amtrak trains used Grand Central during the summers of 2017 and 2018 due to maintenance at Penn Station.[69][70]
Renovation and subsequent expansions Centennial celebration performance, 2013In 1988, the MTA commissioned a study of Grand Central Terminal, which concluded that parts of the terminal could be turned into a retail area.[71]
In 1995, the agency began a $113.8 million renovation of the terminal's interior.[72] All advertisements were removed and the station was restored;[61] for example, the Main Concourse ceiling was cleaned to reveal the painted skyscape and constellations.[73][74][75] The East Stairs, a curved monumental staircase on the east side of the Main Concourse, was added to match the West Stairs.[76] The project's completion was marked with a re-dedication ceremony on October 1, 1998.[77][78]
In December 2006, American Financial sold Grand Central Terminal to Midtown TDR Ventures, LLC, an investment group controlled by Argent Ventures, which renegotiated the lease with the MTA to last until 2274.[79] In 2018, the MTA exercised its option to purchase the terminal, along with the Hudson and Harlem Lines.[59][80] The agency took ownership of the terminal and rail lines in February 2020.[81]
Governor Kathy Hochul and MTA Chair Janno Lieber at the opening of Grand Central Madison, 2023On February 1, 2013, numerous displays, performances, and events were held to celebrate the terminal's centennial.[82][83] The MTA awarded contracts to replace the display boards and public announcement systems and add security cameras at Grand Central Terminal in December 2017.[84] The MTA also proposed to repair the Grand Central Terminal train shed's concrete and steel as part of the 2020–2024 MTA Capital Program.[85] In February 2019, it was announced that the Grand Hyatt New York hotel that abuts Grand Central Terminal to the east would be torn down and replaced with a larger mixed-use structure over the next several years.[86][87] In September 2020, the skyscraper One Vanderbilt opened, along with a train hall at its base, a pedestrian plaza connecting it to the terminal, and an underground passage to the complex's subway station. The plaza was built on a section of Vanderbilt Avenue, permanently closing the section to automobile traffic for the first time.[88]
In January 2023, the MTA's new Grand Central Madison station opened beneath Grand Central Terminal. The new station, serving the Long Island Rail Road, was under development since 2007. The project, officially titled East Side Access, cost $11.1 billion.[89] LIRR trains arrive and depart from a bi-level, eight-track tunnel with four platforms more than 90 feet (27 m) below the Metro-North tracks.[90] The station includes a new 350,000-square-foot retail and dining concourse[91] and new entrances at 45th, 46th, and 48th streets.[92]
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