The Grandest Station of All

 

Grand Central Station in Chicago is now a distant memory to many of the remaining few who may have used or seen the station.  In its place there is a vacant lot that is a reminder of the fortunes of railroads and passenger trains in the years following World War II.  It is also a reminder of the lack of civic appreciation for those grand structures that have outlived their original purpose.  Grand Central was not Chicago's busiest train station, but was the most architecturally significant of the 6 major terminals that helped to define the railroad capital on the nation.  It hosted a group of minor players in the railroad passenger market and was relatively small in terms of the number of loading tracks (6).

Construction of Grand Central was begun in 1889 for the Wisconsin Central Railroad (WC) on the southwest corner of Harrison and Wells Street (then called Fifth Avenue). It was located adjacent to the South branch of the Chicago River and built to replace a temporary station near that location.  Architect Solon S. Beman was chosen for the project, likely based on his designs of the Pullman factory complex and town built between 1880 and 1881.  Beman chose a Norman Castellated style for the structure featuring an immense 247 foot bell and clock tower.

Built of brick, brownstone and granite it featured imposing arches, crenellations and a profusion of turrets along its walls.  An arched carriage court faced Harrison Street.  Confronted with the city's swampy soil conditions Beman placed the tower on a floating foundation supported by pilings sunk 55 feet deep.  This foundation supported the weight of the tower, including its 11,000 pound bell that was designed to ring on the hour.  The tower included a 15 foot clock, at one time one of the largest in the United States.  The station headhouse was 228 feet wide by 482 feet long.  The interior was finished with the finest materials, including marble and stained glass.  The building also included a 100-room hotel that only lasted until 1901.

Beyond the station was the 6 track train shed covered with a self-supporting steel and glass structure, among the largest in the world and an engineering marvel in its own right.  Opened on December 8, 1890, the final cost upon completion was 1 million dollars.  During its construction the station and trackage were purchased from the Wisconsin Central by the Northern Pacific Railway, who sought access to the Chicago market.  Their ownership was equally short-lived as the railroad went bankrupt in 1893 and was forced to sell the station and their Chicago trackage to one of the station's tenants, the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad (B&O).  The B&O created a subsidiary called the Baltimore and Ohio Terminal Railroad to control the tracks from Forest Park to Blue Island, including the stations tracks.

The station would eventually be host to the B&O, the Minneapolis, St. Paul and St. Marie (aka Soo Line, successor to the WC), the Pere Marquette and the Chicago & Great Western.  At its peak it saw only 40 daily intercity trains.  These roads comprised the smallest share of the railroad passenger market in the city.  Political leaders in Chicago began to agitate for a consolidation of railroad passenger operations into one terminal, a project that never came to fruition.  Stations like Grand Central were perceived to be obsolescent white elephants rather than the grand palaces of transportation envisioned by their builders.  The contraction of intercity rail passenger service in the late '50s and '60's would do what the city planners could not.  The railroads were forced to consolidate their trains into Union and Northwestern Stations for reasons of economy.  Intercity passenger trains began operating under the auspices of Amtrak in 1971.  In 1969, the year Grand Central closed, an average of only 210 passengers passed through its doors on a daily basis.

B&O closed the doors of the station on Saturday November 8, 1969.  The building would stand abandoned until it met its date with the wrecker's ball in 1971.  People may question the wanton destruction of an obviously valuable landmark and it comes down to this simple explanation: taxes.  Land with a building is considered improved land and taxed at a higher rate than vacant land.  Railroads are a business, and that does not include architectural preservation of an unused asset.  The City of Chicago has been notably shortsighted in the preservation of its architectural heritage, and no one stepped forward to preserve the station for future generations.  It appears there may have actually been an agreement between the railroad and the South Park Commission to turn the area into parkland.  This never happened and the land is still languishing and waiting for development.  A portion of the land formerly occupied by tracks is now the site of a housing complex known as River City, designed by noted architect Betrand Goldberg.

Numerous ideas have been proposed for the land, including a casino.  One of the more interesting pipe dreams is a plan to build a station for high speed rail service.  The architectural renderings evoke the memory of the old station and its clock tower.  For now, all we have are weeds and memories.

Proposed High Speed railroad station at the site of Grand Central Station