The loss Pennsylvania Station remains me of quotation by the New York Times architecture critic the indomitable Ada Louise Huxtable, "Until the first blow fell, no one was convinced that Penn Station really would be demolished, or that New York would permit this monumental act of vandalism against one of the largest and finest landmarks of its age of Roman elegance. Any city gets what it admires, will pay for, and, ultimately, deserves. Even when we had Penn Station, we couldn’t afford to keep it clean. We want and deserve tin-can architecture in a tinhorn culture. And we will probably be judged not by the monuments we build but by those we have destroyed."
The irony of Grand Central Terminal's salvation was that it was always intended to have a skyscraper built on top of it and has the substructure in place to support one. Instead they had to create an entirely new substructure for the Pan Am (MetLife) building.
The 1920s, prior to the Great Depression, would have been truly a fantastic time to see these beautiful stations, and the great trains that served them!
For sure, Penn Station and Grand Central Station were the creme de la creme of railway stations; many other smaller cities had very beautiful terminals.
Economic circumstances etc aside, it must have been a sight to walk or drive through New York City in the early to mid 1930s. Great architecture, and most of it was new. No potholes in the streets, no graffiti, a brand new city. Also all blended together. Now when you look in big cities all over the world, they‘re building eyesore after eyesore, often right next to preserved architectural treasures.
@@QuasihamsterOh that's right, built around the same time too... I also mourn for the Park Row buildings demolished for the extension on Brooklyn Bridge. Oh there are just too many of them... :(
@@kevinf5354 Here in Europe (Germany) we have a saying regarding gilded age/Edwardian era architecture: What little had survived the war, was destroyed by the modernisation craze of the seventies.
I’ve read online that MSG is running close to their end lease and there’s a non profit organization trying to capitalize on that by proposing to rebuild the original Penn Station.
If there was ever a building worth saving in NYC, it was the Pennsylvania Station. I remember it as a very little boy, departing from there to visit my maternal grandparents in Savannah. The classic beauty, scale, grandeur and elegance of the station was as unparalleled then as it would have been today. It's a great shame that there were not more enlightened people in charge of the PRR, and in NYC civic affairs, back then to see the significance of preserving this architectural masterpiece despite the challenges. But like so many things in life, we never know what we have until it's gone.
@@kmslegal7808It could have easily been indefinitely maintained for free or at very low cost by volunteers and those who seek to preserve Western architecture.
When I was a child my father took my brothers and I to Madison Square Garden for a Knicks basketball game. He told us that there used to be a train station there and we didn't really understand what had been lost. He said it was a beautiful building and he had passed through it in the Army and later for business trips. Thanks for showing me what he was talking about! It was a beautiful building and I do remember Jackie Kennedy was part of a landmark buildngs preservation group in the 1960s and 70s that saved Grand Central Terminal.
Arriving on a train at the “new Penn station“ underneath Madison Square Garden was much like being a rat let loose inside of a garbage dumpster. What a disgrace.
The only saving grace now is that with all the major sports franchises alienating their fans with political stunts. Those teams will be forced to sell MSG. If that should happen it would be smart to rebuild it. I go through Penn regularly. It's no picnic walking in it. When you realize what we've lost. It's all the more heartbreaking.
As part of renovations, they're raising the ceilings to 18 ft and putting a new main entrance in the middle of 33rd street which has been closed and is going to be a pedestrian walkway on that block. The entrance looks like it's going to be too narrow though, not enough staircases and escalators. They're also going to use the post office building across the street that was built with the original Penn Station as an Amtrak train hall for next year, but I wish they would just rebuild Penn, no one cares about MSG the building, just the events that happened there.
@@KalOrtPor Even with the expansion into the Farley Building the capacity is far too low. They should just get rid of that giant toilet of MSG and office tower and build something that fits the transportation needs and at least rudimentary aesthetics. Renovating current Penn Station is putting lipstick on a pig.
@@theknightsarms6922 Hmm. Private companies aren't necessarily any better. After all, it was the Pennsylvania company who wanted the station torn down to build the much criticised Madison Square garden because they couldn't afford the maintenance costs. The much maligned Madison Square garden complex and new Penn station (of which the OP seems to be criticising) were developed by a private company too.
Wonderful and thorough video. It’s sad the Penn Station is gone, but imagine all of the other beautiful buildings we would have lost had it not happened when it did. The loss of this incredible, man-made wonder is devastating, but Penn Station is what really started the preservation movement. Thanks for making this! -Drayton
I hope that sleazy real estate developer, Irving Felt, who bought the air rights to Penn Station for his damned Madison Square Garden, is burning in hell for destroying the magnificent Original Penn Station.
It absolutely blew my mind when I learned some years ago about this magnificent building and that it was demolished to make way for the hideous monstrosity that is MSG. This building and the Singer tower being torn down were both absolute atrocities - all in the name of the almighty short-term profit.
@@stuartlee6622lnteresting, that it was dreary inside..Too expensive to keep clean. Docletian's structure didn't have any automobiles back then to spew toxic emissions. Emissions pollute the Colosseum & the Parthenon. All those cars circling & spewing out there pollution all over these great ancient cities
If there was a silver lining to the cloud of Penn. Station's demise was that people in NYC began to actively push back against the destruction of Grand Central Teminal and other structures; as well as the fight to keep an ultra-high rise hotel on the south side of Central Park from being built and also preventing a 4-lane expressway through lower Manhattan (another of Robert Moses projects)
Please research “mud flood” and the channels Jon Levi, and wooden nickels. The entire narrative we’ve been taught is a lie. These buildings were inherited, not constructed when they said they were.
I think NYC delights in constantly knocking down perfect and beautiful architecture and replacing it with cold, stark glass towers and other eyesores. It seems every large city and their suburbs on this planet is beginning to resemble the movie set of a futuristic "space opera". I deplore the Bauhaus school, which started all this nonsense! I hated seeing the old brownstones and family stores being knocked down in the town of my birth, Ossining New York, for "urban development" - instead of being preserved and restored. BTW, Our car culture is at fault for ridding towns of centrally located "Mom and Pop" stores and destroying the countryside around cities and towns with big box stores, shopping malls and expressways. Kudos to Jackie Onassis and others who fought to preserve Grand Central Station. People - people's souls - need architecture with some grace, warmth and humanity in it's design and a way of living that encourages community feeling.
Thanks very much for the history lesson. I am amazed that I didn't know this story, or had forgotten it, considering that I grew up in upstate New York next to the New York Central Railroad during the 1960's and have always been a railfan. It's outrageous that such a historic and monumental structure was demolished in the name of "progress".
This is REALLY good and well presented. Penn Station was a masterpiece of culture (architecture, engineering, and then some). One note -- part of the decline in passenger service was due to the fact that the railroads were subject to a lot of regulation by the American government while other forms of transport -- most notably the highways -- were subsidized by that same government.
How I first heard of Pennsylvania Station: A cardinal, a bishop, and a young priest were at the old Penn Station. The cardinal gave the priest some money and told him 'Get us three tickets to Pittsburgh, and I want the change in nickels and dimes.' The young priest went to the ticket window and found the ticket seller was wearing a very low-cut dress, and he couldn't stop staring. Before he could stop himself, he blurted out, 'Three pickets to Tittsburgh!' He turned red, ran back to the bishop and cardinal and told them what happened. The bishop said, 'I'll handle this' and went to the ticket window. But he too couldn't stop staring, stumbling through 'I want three tickets to Pittsburgh, and I want the change in...nipples and dimes!' before running back to the cardinal and priest. The cardinal smiled, went over to the ticket window, and said in a clear and steady voice, 'Three tickets to Pittsburgh, and I want the change in nickels and dimes.' As the ticket seller was getting the tickets and change, the cardinal told her, 'Young lady, the Lord has blessed you with great beauty. But one day, as we all must, you will find yourself standing before the Pearly Gates. I pray you will be allowed in. But if you haven't led a good life' - and here he pointed at her - 'Saint Finger will point his peter at you!'
The decade of the 1960's was a particularly harsh period in terms of landmarks lost in NYC. In addition to Penn Station and the Singer Building, the Roxy Theater, Paramount Theater, the Capitol Theater, the Astor Hotel, many other Broadway theaters were lost. Historic preservation was born due the losses of great landmarks during that time.
Well done!! As a kid, I saw Penn Station before, during and after its demise. My Dad worked at NYU and I'd "go to work" with him on a Saturday or 2 per month. Coming from Bergen County, NJ, we came thru the Lincoln Tunnel and my Dad always took the ramps that took us past Penn Station on the way to and from his office.
Well, Penn Station had record ridership recently. Well over 100 million passengers used Penn Station averaging around 600k on a weekday. In the 1960's, the plan for the station capacity was 200k passengers a day, and today its almost 3x as much. In reality, in the 1960's, with the obvious decline in rail travel, they probably in no way forseen such rebounding growth.
Justin Maxwell There’s a moral there somewhere I think - maybe about not shortsightedly destroying magnificent and beautiful structures because they’re “outdated”...
What was done to Pennsylvania Station was a travesty. I'm old enough to remember to have been in it many times, wondering at it's splendor. It was quite illegally demolished and replaced with an eyesore aboveground and a shithole underground. Both are thankfully now being demolished.
They arent demolishing Penn station or Madison Square garden. They're simply relocating Amtraks part of the station to the Farley building, with access to the LIRR on the east side of the building. It's no original Penn station, but it's an improvement.
When I was a kid my parents used to take me on walks all over downtown. We lived in Cicero, so I was blown away by all the beautiful buildings. Even the smaller ones were ornate and stately. It grieves me that so many are gone.
Boy, do I remember the old CNW station! I was a newly minted fireman with the CNW and occasionally had cause to be at the station. Then the CNW sold the air rights and they tore the old lady down to be replaced by a bank-owned office tower. I still remember going up to the (I believe) third floor and visiting the dispatchers' offices with paint peeling of the ceilings and walls of the ancient structure.
How I remember the old CNW terminal! Beautiful green stone (marble?). Imposing and ornate. Worthy of America’s second city. The current disposable structure is an absolute piece of trash.
being from Canada and never having been in NYC until 2018, I had heard of Penn Station. I am here because the whole topic of demolishing this masterpiece on MadMen! Grand Central is really nice, but this was spectacular. We thoroughly enjoyed our trip to Manhattan, walked 20 miles in 3 days....
Thanks Ruairidh, a fascinating history into a station I knew little about. Such a shame. If you're interested in doing another station, might I suggest Euston, or Birmingham's Curzon Street? Both stations that were demolished and replaced with carbunkles or nothing, and will be revitalised (and hopefully improved) with HS2.
The demolition of Penn Station still hurts me personally (and yet it was torn down decades before I was born and could ever step foot in it). The current Penn Station is a dark, dirty, jumbled mess compared to that masterpiece of architecture. It’s tragic.
As a rail ran and a sports fan this story is bitter sweet to me. I'm way too young to have seen old Penn Station, but I have been to Grand Central. I've also been to several events at Madison Square Garden and it was one of the coolest sports related trips I've ever had. The Knicks were good the first time I went with Ewing and Oakley still on the team. MSG is a landmark on its own now whether its for basketball, hockey, boxing, or concerts. I've also been lucky enough to see Billy Joel there. Me and my brother drove nearly 14 hours to see that show even though his tour was coming to our city.
Great Video 😊 It’s heart breaking that Penn Station has to be demolished, inspiring to see that Grand Central Station survives, and the Post Office building is being restored 🙏🚂❤️. Great channel ❤️
I had a bunch of pictures I took around 1960 when I used to climb up to the roofs of New York buildings. I had a bunch of Penn Station and also Grand Central. But they were all lost in a fire.
Oh boy what a daredevil. Your imagination served you well to take all those l those photos.. my God destroyed by fire I'm sorry man, a great loss. But you must have photogenic memory. Very sad we can't retrieve those images from your mind..But still thanks again for doing that.You and yours please take care stay safe during this pandemic
Puts the demolition of the euston arch in to perspective, we lost many grand buildings over here in britain at the same time. Ive heard it quoted that bad development was responsible for far more damage than hitlers bombers! So sad to see Penn station is gone, comiserations from Britain.
8:20 “The final structure required to connect with the New Haven’s main line towards Boston was the magnificent Hell Gate Bridge…” The Hell Gate Bridge became the inspiration for the Sydney Harbor Bridge in Australia.
I travelled through the old Penn Station and it was a marvel, dirty but something to behold. I commuted on the LIRR into Manhatten in the 70's, it was a horror, still is.
Lovely documentary on a lost treasure. Leaves you wondering how many goodbyes were made in that vast building and how many tear-filled welcome homes, especially at the end of the war with all those demobbed service personnel passing through it
The lasting engineering problem solved was the tunnel under the Hudson. Penn Station was a tremendous work of architectural art and a gigantic white elephant. No one projected the preeminence of the automobile at the time of its construction, and the near-bankrupt Pennsylvania / PennCentral could not justify paying for it any longer. A victim of its time.
The Pennsylvania station which was built in 1910 was grand architecture of that time. May be the loss making company can not run for long, a new circular structure built after 1968 has more source of Income and has various different facilities. I visited this new station in the year 1998 and again in 2017, where I have seen the station is very hectic but has lot of other facilities too. Time to time the improvement takes place. It is a principle of the development. Thanks for telling us the interesting stories!
A companion might describe what was saved from the old Pennsylvania Station. Two eagles and the statue of Samuel Rea were saved at the site. Some eagles are in the Central Park Zoo, nicely displayed. Four eagles are in Philadelphia, and the statue of Alexander Cassatt is at Rensallear University.
Many years ago I spoke with Stuart Saunders, then CEO of the :Penn Central. We discussed briefly the destruction of Penn Station. I remember him saying: "You should see the cost of heating that place." Well, he was right about that, what with all the empty space there The cost of operating hat station was the main reason he wanted it torn. Interestingly, Grand Central Terminal, which I always thought far more beautiful than Penn Station. what with its starry sky ceiling, especially when it was cleaned. Which is not to say that the loss of Penn Station wasn't a great mistake. Stephen Aug
Simply marvelous, non-nonsense understated narration heightens the pathos of the loss and effectively tells the story of Pennsylvania Station. Though I am old enough to have seen it as a child and young teenager I don't think I ever quite got there (unless too young to appreciate it's magnificence) though I grew up in South Jersey near Philly. A sad story. The ugliness ushered into New York by the satanic Robert Mose's administration as city planner scarred my beloved adopted hometown in so many ways. Like the BQE absolutely ripping neighborhood's apart, like Brooklyn Heights and whose ghastly aesthetics we have still to deal with today.
11:43 Since the B&O's tracks only extended to Philadelphia, from there they used the Philadelphia & Reading to Bound Brook, NJ, and the Central Railroad of NJ's mainline to its Jersey City Terminal. Upon opening of the Holland Tunnel in 1927, the B&O provided bus connections directly from the train to Manhattan. Known for most of its run as The Royal Blue Line, service north of Baltimore ended in April of 1958.
Well done sir. I've watched many videos on this subject as it is a well documented study on how NOT to handle iconic old structures, and I must say that you did a great job!
This was a great video. I never knew that sleazy Irving Felt was president of the Graham Paige Car company, which I thought had gone out or business in the 1930's, when the last Graham-Paige was built. I like the fabulous pictures of the original Penn Station before and after it was built by 1910. I still can't believe that the New York City Planning Council voted to have such a world class building, dirty as it was, to be pulled down for a stupid sports arena. Didn't the city planners realize that Penn Station would now be a hell hole that would be around for over 50 years or to whenever it can be replaced, hopefully by a reconstruction of the Original Penn Station. I think that the Pennsylvania RR, knowing in the mid 50's that it would be bankrupt by 1970, should have either donated or sold Penn Station to New York City. AMTRAK replace the Penn RR, New York Central, and New Haven RR by 1970 and a decent Penn Station was therefore still needed for long distance travelers and for local LIRR and New Jersey Transit commuters.
I live in Charlotte, the largest city in the US state of North Carolina, The story of Penn Station really punches me right in the gut because my city has known the scourge of the bulldozer as much as any other. Looking at old photos of Charlotte one would be hard-pressed to recognize but perhaps a few buildings. Much like Penn station, developers in the 1960s and 70s demanded the prime real estate taken up by these historic buildings, and today only a few are left. Even as recently as last year a historic 1920s art deco building was torn down and is now being replaced with condominiums. I still think my city is beautiful, but a mix between the ultra modern structures, and the historical southern architecture would a much more beautiful city make in my opinion. What happened to Penn station is a crime, i’m not saying that every single little building on this planet needs to be preserved, and I also recognize that older architecture does gain value over time, there are many brutalist style buildings being torn down today that might be missed by future generations, but how anyone could not have seen the significance of Penn station is beyond me.
It’s amazing that people waste resources and money creating buildings that last decades before being demolished due to design and use issues. It would have been great to see the building today.
A wonderful video providing glimpses of long lost architectural land marks sacrificed to mammon and change of TIME. Preservation is very expensive and difficult to execute. Thank you for the lovely piece of architectural history with a wish that all that remain can be preserved..
Firstly, brilliants work. Your videos are addictive. I particularly love these ‘Places lost in time’ ones. I never even knew of the existence of this wonderful building. I’d like to think that in these more cosmopolitan times, the distraction of such buildings would not take place. Since watching this video, I’ve been trying to find actual construction photos of the station. I’ve trawled the internet to no avail. With such spectacular architecture, I can’t accept that construction photos don’t exist as cameras were almost commonplace at the time of building. I’m most likely looking in the wrong places.
Same story in Belgium after WW 2, and especially during the so called "Golden Sixties": many many fantastic buildings, especially in the capital Brussels were demolished, to make way for ugly modern building, which were however less expensive to maintain. And indeed: the 19th century Palais of Justice, once being the tallest building in the world, being even bigger than the Vatican still exists, but is in constant repair since several decades now. I wouldn't be surprised if by now, it wouldn't have been better to build exactly the same one again, even if wages have risen dramatically by now... Pro's and con's...
I don't think they were less expensive to maintain - that was another lie. I think they were torn down for our benefit: so we did not question: who built them.
When you look at what replaced Pennsylvania Station above ground level you realise the folly its destruction. The new use of the old Post Office building, however, is encouraging.
Another great video and the shots of 50s and earlier American trains are wonderful (especially the B&O). I've seen GCT and it lived up to it's billing as a magnificent structure even if the train only goes to Poughkeepsie now. I would have loved to have seen Penn Station in it's finery especially as the present station would give Birmingham New Street a run for the worst city station anywhere.
The closest British answer to such an act of vandalism would be the destruction of the original London Euston (in particular the Euston Arch), London's Broad St & Glasgow St. Enoch (the original Subway station building is still with us, thank god). In fact (to briefly deviate from Penn Station but in a similar vein), under what has become known as 'The Bruce Report' dating from 1945, the entirety of Glasgow City Centre was proposed to be flattened and completely remodelled. This would have involved the destruction of not only all 4 of Glasgow then-mainline railway terminal stations (Central, Queen St, Buchanan St & St. Enoch), but of the Glasgow City Chambers, Kelvingrove Art Gallery & Museum, the Glasgow School of Art, Glasgow University's Gilbert Scott building, among so many others. Such a radical plan was ultimately rejected on the grounds of cost, but then, as undoubtedly would be the case now, howls of public outrage at such a catastrophic act of vandalism would have played it's part in killing the idea of such a plan being implemented in full stone dead. That didn't stop some aspects of the plan becoming reality in the 60s/70s (namely, St. Enoch & Buchanan St stations being flattened, an Orbital motorway was partially built at the cost of an entire district and two more districts were flattened and completely rebuilt, plus several of our historic buildings succumbing to fire, neglect or plain old disuse over the intervening decades). We are still paying the price for such short-sighted blunders today and will be for some time. But I digress. Top work taking us through the station's history leading up to and including the most shameful blot on New York's history that is it's destruction. The last of these in this case is always hard to watch; a cursory glance at the comment section reveals I ain't alone in thinking that.
Luckily nowadays historic public stuctures are more and more loved and protected. Those structures are more then just a building they define the soul of a country and culture. Even some buildings who were once regarded as an eye sore in their time of construction ( Eifeltower Paris for example) have became iconic.
I'm a New Yorker born and raised and was a teenager when the new Penn Station/Madison Square Garden complex was built. Ugly edifice, as a kid I could never figure out why such an obviously "round" building was always called "square". I grew up without ever seeing a basketball game or a music concert in the Garden because the tickets were always scalped before I could get to the ticket booths. I remember vividly slovenly dressed young men whispering "smoke, smoke" in my ear as I rushed to my trains during my daily commutes. To be fair, I think the city has cleaned up the pushers since then, and the New York Landmarks Preservation Commission has been able to spare many other buildings from the wrecking ball citing Penn Station as a particularly blatant example of New York real estate run amok.
I may be wrong, but Amtrak currently serves Penn Station, but not the grander preserved Grand Central, which is used only for regional and commuter rail, right? That's unfortunate, since it means Penn Station is more important for long distance rail. I've been to a few stations in the US, among the nice old ones were Chicago Union Station, Los Angeles, and Philadelphia's 30th Street Station, which would be nicer if they'd give it a good cleanup, but Washington DC's Union Station might be the nicest one I've been too, giant waiting room, lots of marble and statues, pretty grand, plus it had lots of shops, restaurants, and a movie theater, and connected to Metro Rail, regional rail, and busses.
Up until CV there was a great need to new tunnels under the Hudson. There were plans that got nixed ten years ago. Now they were to be that and even more expanded. There was a great more influx of people using the terminal. All that though may be for naught. With business realizing they can do more work remotely. The whole reason for having office space in Manhattan is blown to smithereens. Right now Penn and much of NYC is pretty much a ghost town. A former Shadow of itself. Oh and Kaiser Wilhelm DeBlasio isn't making it any better.
A really good structured documentary with all the details of history. One thing that was bothering me and you should check out are the weird background noises during silent moments.
Years ago I walked through the old station, I remember thebig dark grey granite columns and thought it was gloomy, my boyfriend told me it was modeled on the Baths of Caracalla--- hard to keep those Roman emperors straight.
I still cannot believe that they tore down this beautiful work of architecture to build the abysmal, depressing international style one on 34th St now. So maddening!
I'm surprised there wasn't any mention of the proposal to Rebuild Penn back to it's original glory, albeit with a modern touch like the taxiways being used as public arcades, the station being changed from a terminal to a through running station, and the removal of a number of the tracks so the platforms can be widened. Previous website: www.rebuildpennstation.org/ Current website: www.rethinkpennstationnyc.org/ Website talking about the track level improvements: www.rethinknyc.org/rethinkpenn/
Excellent video about Penn Station Ruairidh, both with the way it was put together and the facts/statistics used in it. It was certainly a beautiful station before Madison Square Garden was built. Just one minor thing I wanted to point out that stood out to me. At 20:06, you mentioned that the Penn Central was formed in 1968 by the merger of the New York Central, Pennsylvania Railroad and the New Haven Railroad. That's not entirely true. In 1968, the Penn Central was formed as a merger between just the New York Central and the Pennsylvania Railroad. One year later, in 1969, the New Haven was absorbed into it. The New Haven was already bankrupt at that time and the Penn Central didn't even want it to become part of their system because of the bankruptcy the New Haven was in at that time.
I’m bitter about it even though it was demolished decades before I was even born. I can’t imagine what they were thinking as they were taking sledgehammers to that incredible facade and pulling down the bronze sculptures. I personally couldn’t have been a worker on that site, I’d feel party to a crime.
The video actually mistaken because if you go to the track levels at New York Penn Station you should see that the entire station complex is third rail and overhead wires.
Until fairly recently you could still see some of the original glass bricks and terrazzo flooring in the shop space that's now occupied by the KFC / Taco Bell / Pizza Hut on the north side of the main concourse.
I still think it's pretty wild that all of the LIRR Is 3rd rail...it would be so unbelievably expensive now. I believe that 3rd rail is like 4-6 times as expensive per mile compared to catenary electric
For water crossings, a tunnel is generally more costly to construct than a bridge. However, navigational considerations at some locations may limit the use of high bridges or drawbridge spans when crossing shipping channels, necessitating the use of a tunnel. If its a short distance of less than a mile, on the average a bridge is much less expensive than a tunnel.
You leave the Pennsylvania station 'bout a quarter to four, Read a magazine, and then you're in Baltimore, Dinner in the Diner, nothing could be Finer, Than to have your ham n eggs in Carolina. Such glamour, and such beauty, from the days when men built things which really mattered. A wonderful video. We had Euston, London's first intercity terminal, with its Doric arch and Great Hall, all destroyed around the same time, to be replaced by concrete bunkers. What a disgusting waste it all is.
And look what happened to Birmingham City Centre in the late 50s and 60s. It is said the city planners wrought far more destruction than the Luftwaffe did in 1941! And we get cloned soulless replacements, which thankfully are now going - the Library for one, but not sure its repalcement is that wondeful! Architects pah!
And in another echo from New York the finest station in London (St Pancras) would have also been destroyed but for the efforts of Sir John Betjemen. Could Grand Central Terminal and St Pancras both been lost as well as Penn Station and Euston - certainly possible and both cities would be the big losers if they had.
Toronto almost lost its beautiful Beaux Arts train terminal, Union Station, in the 1970s, in a manner that paralleled the Penn Station experience. Only 50 years old at the time, it was to be torn down and replaced by a modernist multi-building redevelopment of the station precinct, of which only the CN Tower wound up being built. Happily, the station was saved through public pressure. It is now nearing the much-delayed completion of a $1 billion (Cdn) renovation and restoration, the busiest public transportation hub in Canada.
20:49 God, when I went there 2 years ago I thought that building was cool. I could never imagine an even more beautiful structure stood in front of it before... I don't even remember what the building on the other side of the road looks like
The loss Pennsylvania Station remains me of quotation by the New York Times architecture critic the indomitable Ada Louise Huxtable, "Until the first blow fell, no one was convinced that Penn Station really would be demolished, or that New York would permit this monumental act of vandalism against one of the largest and finest landmarks of its age of Roman elegance. Any city gets what it admires, will pay for, and, ultimately, deserves. Even when we had Penn Station, we couldn’t afford to keep it clean. We want and deserve tin-can architecture in a tinhorn culture. And we will probably be judged not by the monuments we build but by those we have destroyed."
Thank Dem damn hook 👃 Oye
Trump2024 @williamhilbert8324
The only consolation for this outrage is that it provoked a conservation movement that has saved many beautiful NY buildings.
The irony of Grand Central Terminal's salvation was that it was always intended to have a skyscraper built on top of it and has the substructure in place to support one.
Instead they had to create an entirely new substructure for the Pan Am (MetLife) building.
The 1920s, prior to the Great Depression, would have been truly a fantastic time to see these beautiful stations, and the great trains that served them!
b3j8 That was certainly the golden age of rail travel in the US - maybe there can be another some day...
@@richardbarry04553 Perhaps.
For sure, Penn Station and Grand Central
Station were the creme de la creme of
railway stations; many other smaller cities
had very beautiful terminals.
Economic circumstances etc aside, it must have been a sight to walk or drive through New York City in the early to mid 1930s. Great architecture, and most of it was new. No potholes in the streets, no graffiti, a brand new city. Also all blended together. Now when you look in big cities all over the world, they‘re building eyesore after eyesore, often right next to preserved architectural treasures.
One of many precious buildings lost in NYC. The Singer Building and Penn Station are my favorites, both went down about the same time.
Both went up and down about the same time. :(
@@QuasihamsterOh that's right, built around the same time too...
I also mourn for the Park Row buildings demolished for the extension on Brooklyn Bridge.
Oh there are just too many of them... :(
@@kevinf5354 Here in Europe (Germany) we have a saying regarding gilded age/Edwardian era architecture: What little had survived the war, was destroyed by the modernisation craze of the seventies.
I’ve read online that MSG is running close to their end lease and there’s a non profit organization trying to capitalize on that by proposing to rebuild the original Penn Station.
@@bingli4927
It would be too expensive to rebuild in the
same way as the destroyed Penn Station.
I’ve always thought the destruction of Penn Station was an absurd tragedy - that building was an absolute gem that should have been preserved
*"Where once, we entered the city like gods. Now we scurry in like rats, which is probably what we deserve.”*
*~ Vincent Scully*
If there was ever a building worth saving in NYC, it was the Pennsylvania Station. I remember it as a very little boy, departing from there to visit my maternal grandparents in Savannah. The classic beauty, scale, grandeur and elegance of the station was as unparalleled then as it would have been today. It's a great shame that there were not more enlightened people in charge of the PRR, and in NYC civic affairs, back then to see the significance of preserving this architectural masterpiece despite the challenges. But like so many things in life, we never know what we have until it's gone.
nothing to do with being enlightened. It was all about the money and saving the railroad from bankruptcy for a time
@@kmslegal7808It could have easily been indefinitely maintained for free or at very low cost by volunteers and those who seek to preserve Western architecture.
When I was a child my father took my brothers and I to Madison Square Garden for a Knicks basketball game. He told us that there used to be a train station there and we didn't really understand what had been lost. He said it was a beautiful building and he had passed through it in the Army and later for business trips. Thanks for showing me what he was talking about! It was a beautiful building and I do remember Jackie Kennedy was part of a landmark buildngs preservation group in the 1960s and 70s that saved Grand Central Terminal.
Arriving on a train at the “new Penn station“ underneath Madison Square Garden was much like being a rat let loose inside of a garbage dumpster. What a disgrace.
The only saving grace now is that with all the major sports franchises alienating their fans with political stunts. Those teams will be forced to sell MSG. If that should happen it would be smart to rebuild it. I go through Penn regularly. It's no picnic walking in it. When you realize what we've lost. It's all the more heartbreaking.
The few times I was in the new Penn station instantly generated depression and fear as most areas have low ceilings.
Seriously though lol
As part of renovations, they're raising the ceilings to 18 ft and putting a new main entrance in the middle of 33rd street which has been closed and is going to be a pedestrian walkway on that block. The entrance looks like it's going to be too narrow though, not enough staircases and escalators. They're also going to use the post office building across the street that was built with the original Penn Station as an Amtrak train hall for next year, but I wish they would just rebuild Penn, no one cares about MSG the building, just the events that happened there.
@@KalOrtPor Even with the expansion into the Farley Building the capacity is far too low. They should just get rid of that giant toilet of MSG and office tower and build something that fits the transportation needs and at least rudimentary aesthetics. Renovating current Penn Station is putting lipstick on a pig.
Where once we entered like royalty
now we scurry through like rats.
Vincent Scully
Couldn't have said it better myself
@@theknightsarms6922 Hmm. Private companies aren't necessarily any better. After all, it was the Pennsylvania company who wanted the station torn down to build the much criticised Madison Square garden because they couldn't afford the maintenance costs. The much maligned Madison Square garden complex and new Penn station (of which the OP seems to be criticising) were developed by a private company too.
Wonderful and thorough video. It’s sad the Penn Station is gone, but imagine all of the other beautiful buildings we would have lost had it not happened when it did. The loss of this incredible, man-made wonder is devastating, but Penn Station is what really started the preservation movement. Thanks for making this! -Drayton
It should’ve started the moment they considered tearing Penn Station down, before the wrecking ball struck the first blow.
Shocking civic vandalism. It only lasted over 60 years.
I hope that sleazy real estate developer, Irving Felt, who bought the air rights to Penn Station for his damned Madison Square Garden, is burning in hell for destroying the magnificent Original Penn Station.
I cannot belive that a building this amazing was ever tore down
It was ugly, cold, and dreary inside.
Best that it was torn down!
Hopefully the new Monyhan Station will be more welcoming.
It absolutely blew my mind when I learned some years ago about this magnificent building and that it was demolished to make way for the hideous monstrosity that is MSG. This building and the Singer tower being torn down were both absolute atrocities - all in the name of the almighty short-term profit.
@@stuartlee6622lnteresting, that it was dreary inside..Too expensive to keep clean. Docletian's structure didn't have any automobiles back then to spew toxic emissions. Emissions pollute the Colosseum & the Parthenon. All those cars circling & spewing out there pollution all over these great ancient cities
If there was a silver lining to the cloud of Penn. Station's
demise was that people in NYC began to actively push
back against the destruction of Grand Central Teminal
and other structures; as well as the fight to keep an
ultra-high rise hotel on the south side of Central Park
from being built and also preventing a 4-lane expressway
through lower Manhattan (another of Robert Moses
projects)
Please research “mud flood” and the channels Jon Levi, and wooden nickels. The entire narrative we’ve been taught is a lie. These buildings were inherited, not constructed when they said they were.
It’s like knocking down the Parthenon 🏛.
I think NYC delights in constantly knocking down perfect and beautiful architecture and replacing it with cold, stark glass towers and other eyesores. It seems every large city and their suburbs on this planet is beginning to resemble the movie set of a futuristic "space opera". I deplore the Bauhaus school, which started all this nonsense! I hated seeing the old brownstones and family stores being knocked down in the town of my birth, Ossining New York, for "urban development" - instead of being preserved and restored. BTW, Our car culture is at fault for ridding towns of centrally located "Mom and Pop" stores and destroying the countryside around cities and towns with big box stores, shopping malls and expressways. Kudos to Jackie Onassis and others who fought to preserve Grand Central Station. People - people's souls - need architecture with some grace, warmth and humanity in it's design and a way of living that encourages community feeling.
Thanks very much for the history lesson. I am amazed that I didn't know this story, or had forgotten it, considering that I grew up in upstate New York next to the New York Central Railroad during the 1960's and have always been a railfan. It's outrageous that such a historic and monumental structure was demolished in the name of "progress".
I remember Penn Station from the mid 1950s. Its loss was tragic.
This is REALLY good and well presented. Penn Station was a masterpiece of culture (architecture, engineering, and then some). One note -- part of the decline in passenger service was due to the fact that the railroads were subject to a lot of regulation by the American government while other forms of transport -- most notably the highways -- were subsidized by that same government.
I have been obsessed with Penn Station for YEARS, thank you for the video.
How I first heard of Pennsylvania Station:
A cardinal, a bishop, and a young priest were at the old Penn Station. The cardinal gave the priest some money and told him 'Get us three tickets to Pittsburgh, and I want the change in nickels and dimes.'
The young priest went to the ticket window and found the ticket seller was wearing a very low-cut dress, and he couldn't stop staring. Before he could stop himself, he blurted out, 'Three pickets to Tittsburgh!' He turned red, ran back to the bishop and cardinal and told them what happened.
The bishop said, 'I'll handle this' and went to the ticket window. But he too couldn't stop staring, stumbling through 'I want three tickets to Pittsburgh, and I want the change in...nipples and dimes!' before running back to the cardinal and priest.
The cardinal smiled, went over to the ticket window, and said in a clear and steady voice, 'Three tickets to Pittsburgh, and I want the change in nickels and dimes.'
As the ticket seller was getting the tickets and change, the cardinal told her, 'Young lady, the Lord has blessed you with great beauty. But one day, as we all must, you will find yourself standing before the Pearly Gates. I pray you will be allowed in. But if you haven't led a good life' - and here he pointed at her - 'Saint Finger will point his peter at you!'
The decade of the 1960's was a particularly harsh period in terms of landmarks lost in NYC. In addition to Penn Station and the Singer Building, the Roxy Theater, Paramount Theater, the Capitol Theater, the Astor Hotel, many other Broadway theaters were lost. Historic preservation was born due the losses of great landmarks during that time.
All by design. The old world has been systematicall torn down.
The bolsheviks were the worst: 90% demolished in the USSR.
Well done!! As a kid, I saw Penn Station before, during and after its demise. My Dad worked at NYU and I'd "go to work" with him on a Saturday or 2 per month. Coming from Bergen County, NJ, we came thru the Lincoln Tunnel and my Dad always took the ramps that took us past Penn Station on the way to and from his office.
Well, Penn Station had record ridership recently. Well over 100 million passengers used Penn Station averaging around 600k on a weekday. In the 1960's, the plan for the station capacity was 200k passengers a day, and today its almost 3x as much. In reality, in the 1960's, with the obvious decline in rail travel, they probably in no way forseen such rebounding growth.
Justin Maxwell There’s a moral there somewhere I think - maybe about not shortsightedly destroying magnificent and beautiful structures because they’re “outdated”...
To destroy this station is a CULTURAL CRIME.
What was done to Pennsylvania Station was a travesty. I'm old enough to remember to have been in it many times, wondering at it's splendor. It was quite illegally demolished and replaced with an eyesore aboveground and a shithole underground. Both are thankfully now being demolished.
They arent demolishing Penn station or Madison Square garden. They're simply relocating Amtraks part of the station to the Farley building, with access to the LIRR on the east side of the building. It's no original Penn station, but it's an improvement.
Like everyone I am still so angry that they tore down the Chicago Northwestern Terminal in Chicago in 1984!!!
When I was a kid my parents used to take me on walks all over downtown. We lived in Cicero, so I was blown away by all the beautiful buildings. Even the smaller ones were ornate and stately.
It grieves me that so many are gone.
Boy, do I remember the old CNW station! I was a newly minted fireman with the CNW and occasionally had cause to be at the station. Then the CNW sold the air rights and they tore the old lady down to be replaced by a bank-owned office tower. I still remember going up to the (I believe) third floor and visiting the dispatchers' offices with paint peeling of the ceilings and walls of the ancient structure.
@@mbryson2899 I feel your grief over that as well
@@uhlijohn Sounds like great memories!
How I remember the old CNW terminal! Beautiful green stone (marble?). Imposing and ornate. Worthy of America’s second city. The current disposable structure is an absolute piece of trash.
While growing up in Sunnyside I would go to the 39th street bridge and watch the trains on my school holidays. Great memories.
being from Canada and never having been in NYC until 2018, I had heard of Penn Station. I am here because the whole topic of demolishing this masterpiece on MadMen! Grand Central is really nice, but this was spectacular. We thoroughly enjoyed our trip to Manhattan, walked 20 miles in 3 days....
Thanks Ruairidh, a fascinating history into a station I knew little about. Such a shame.
If you're interested in doing another station, might I suggest Euston, or Birmingham's Curzon Street? Both stations that were demolished and replaced with carbunkles or nothing, and will be revitalised (and hopefully improved) with HS2.
I had to turn this video off. I could feel my heart getting ready to break all over again.
It’s a tragedy
The demolition of Penn Station still hurts me personally (and yet it was torn down decades before I was born and could ever step foot in it).
The current Penn Station is a dark, dirty, jumbled mess compared to that masterpiece of architecture. It’s tragic.
As a rail ran and a sports fan this story is bitter sweet to me. I'm way too young to have seen old Penn Station, but I have been to Grand Central. I've also been to several events at Madison Square Garden and it was one of the coolest sports related trips I've ever had. The Knicks were good the first time I went with Ewing and Oakley still on the team. MSG is a landmark on its own now whether its for basketball, hockey, boxing, or concerts. I've also been lucky enough to see Billy Joel there. Me and my brother drove nearly 14 hours to see that show even though his tour was coming to our city.
Great Video 😊 It’s heart breaking that Penn Station has to be demolished, inspiring to see that Grand Central Station survives, and the Post Office building is being restored 🙏🚂❤️. Great channel ❤️
i heard make the post office into a new Penn train station?
I had a bunch of pictures I took around 1960 when I used to climb up to the roofs of New York buildings. I had a bunch of Penn Station and also Grand Central. But they were all lost in a fire.
Oh boy what a daredevil. Your imagination served you well to take all those l those photos.. my God destroyed by fire I'm sorry man, a great loss. But you must have photogenic memory. Very sad we can't retrieve those images from your mind..But still thanks again for doing that.You and yours please take care stay safe during this pandemic
Puts the demolition of the euston arch in to perspective, we lost many grand buildings over here in britain at the same time. Ive heard it quoted that bad development was responsible for far more damage than hitlers bombers! So sad to see Penn station is gone, comiserations from Britain.
8:20 “The final structure required to connect with the New Haven’s main line towards Boston was the magnificent Hell Gate Bridge…”
The Hell Gate Bridge became the inspiration for the Sydney Harbor Bridge in Australia.
Look at Tyne Bridge in Newcastle on Tyne, UK, built by the Cleveland Bridge and Engineering Company - the firm which build the bridge in Oz.
Sad, sad not only about the building but about labour of its architect and the workers.
I travelled through the old Penn Station and it was a marvel, dirty but something to behold. I commuted on the LIRR into Manhatten in the 70's, it was a horror, still is.
Was it dirty?
Lovely documentary on a lost treasure. Leaves you wondering how many goodbyes were made in that vast building and how many tear-filled welcome homes, especially at the end of the war with all those demobbed service personnel passing through it
The lasting engineering problem solved was the tunnel under the Hudson. Penn Station was a tremendous work of architectural art and a gigantic white elephant. No one projected the preeminence of the automobile at the time of its construction, and the near-bankrupt Pennsylvania / PennCentral could not justify paying for it any longer. A victim of its time.
The Pennsylvania station which was built in 1910 was grand architecture of that time. May be the loss making company can not run for long, a new circular structure built after 1968 has more source of Income and has various different facilities. I visited this new station in the year 1998 and again in 2017, where I have seen the station is very hectic but has lot of other facilities too. Time to time the improvement takes place. It is a principle of the development. Thanks for telling us the interesting stories!
I stayed at the hotel Pennsylvania in 2014. One of the biggest dumps I ever stayed at.
A companion might describe what was saved from the old Pennsylvania Station. Two eagles and the statue of Samuel Rea were saved at the site. Some eagles are in the Central Park Zoo, nicely displayed. Four eagles are in Philadelphia, and the statue of Alexander Cassatt is at Rensallear University.
Very thorough and well written story and thank you very much for the music free narration.
Nice work. One of your best. A good reprise of a tragedy
Look at the World Fairs.. does anyone really believe the americans build this station? How? Why? From what?
Many years ago I spoke with Stuart Saunders, then CEO of the :Penn Central. We discussed briefly the destruction of Penn Station. I remember him saying: "You should see the cost of heating that place." Well, he was right about that, what with all the empty space there The cost of operating hat station was the main reason he wanted it torn. Interestingly, Grand Central Terminal, which I always thought far more beautiful than Penn Station. what with its starry sky ceiling, especially when it was cleaned. Which is not to say that the loss of Penn Station wasn't a great mistake. Stephen Aug
Simply marvelous, non-nonsense understated narration heightens the pathos of the loss and effectively tells the story of Pennsylvania Station. Though I am old enough to have seen it as a child and young teenager I don't think I ever quite got there (unless too young to appreciate it's magnificence) though I grew up in South Jersey near Philly. A sad story. The ugliness ushered into New York by the satanic Robert Mose's administration as city planner scarred my beloved adopted hometown in so many ways. Like the BQE absolutely ripping neighborhood's apart, like Brooklyn Heights and whose ghastly aesthetics we have still to deal with today.
11:43 Since the B&O's tracks only extended to Philadelphia, from there they used the Philadelphia & Reading to Bound Brook, NJ, and the Central Railroad of NJ's mainline to its Jersey City Terminal. Upon opening of the Holland Tunnel in 1927, the B&O provided bus connections directly from the train to Manhattan. Known for most of its run as The Royal Blue Line, service north of Baltimore ended in April of 1958.
Well done sir. I've watched many videos on this subject as it is a well documented study on how NOT to handle iconic old structures, and I must say that you did a great job!
This was a great video. I never knew that sleazy Irving Felt was president of the Graham Paige Car company, which I thought had gone out or business in the 1930's, when the last Graham-Paige was built. I like the fabulous pictures of the original Penn Station before and after it was built by 1910. I still can't believe that the New York City Planning Council voted to have such a world class building, dirty as it was, to be pulled down for a stupid sports arena. Didn't the city planners realize that Penn Station would now be a hell hole that would be around for over 50 years or to whenever it can be replaced, hopefully by a reconstruction of the Original Penn Station. I think that the Pennsylvania RR, knowing in the mid 50's that it would be bankrupt by 1970, should have either donated or sold Penn Station to New York City. AMTRAK replace the Penn RR, New York Central, and New Haven RR by 1970 and a decent Penn Station was therefore still needed for long distance travelers and for local LIRR and New Jersey Transit commuters.
Yes, I've been waiting for you to do Penn Station in New York, thank you so much!
Great video. I had never heard of this station before. Excellent narration as usual.
I live in Charlotte, the largest city in the US state of North Carolina, The story of Penn Station really punches me right in the gut because my city has known the scourge of the bulldozer as much as any other. Looking at old photos of Charlotte one would be hard-pressed to recognize but perhaps a few buildings. Much like Penn station, developers in the 1960s and 70s demanded the prime real estate taken up by these historic buildings, and today only a few are left. Even as recently as last year a historic 1920s art deco building was torn down and is now being replaced with condominiums. I still think my city is beautiful, but a mix between the ultra modern structures, and the historical southern architecture would a much more beautiful city make in my opinion. What happened to Penn station is a crime, i’m not saying that every single little building on this planet needs to be preserved, and I also recognize that older architecture does gain value over time, there are many brutalist style buildings being torn down today that might be missed by future generations, but how anyone could not have seen the significance of Penn station is beyond me.
It’s amazing that people waste resources and money creating buildings that last decades before being demolished due to design and use issues. It would have been great to see the building today.
That building could have lasted forever if they hadn’t torn it down
A wonderful video providing glimpses of long lost architectural land marks sacrificed to mammon and change of TIME.
Preservation is very expensive and difficult to execute.
Thank you for the lovely piece of architectural history with a wish that all that remain can be preserved..
I used walk by MSG all the time, I can only imagine walking past this behemoth of a building must have been like. An absolute crime.
Great video. Very well made. Thank you.
Firstly, brilliants work. Your videos are addictive.
I particularly love these ‘Places lost in time’ ones. I never even knew of the existence of this wonderful building. I’d like to think that in these more cosmopolitan times, the distraction of such buildings would not take place. Since watching this video, I’ve been trying to find actual construction photos of the station. I’ve trawled the internet to no avail. With such spectacular architecture, I can’t accept that construction photos don’t exist as cameras were almost commonplace at the time of building. I’m most likely looking in the wrong places.
This is so sad. It was a beautiful landmark, now it’s one of the worst places in New York City.
Same story in Belgium after WW 2, and especially during the so called "Golden Sixties": many many fantastic buildings, especially in the capital Brussels were demolished, to make way for ugly modern building, which were however less expensive to maintain. And indeed: the 19th century Palais of Justice, once being the tallest building in the world, being even bigger than the Vatican still exists, but is in constant repair since several decades now. I wouldn't be surprised if by now, it wouldn't have been better to build exactly the same one again, even if wages have risen dramatically by now... Pro's and con's...
I don't think they were less expensive to maintain - that was another lie.
I think they were torn down for our benefit: so we did not question: who built them.
New York City in the early twentieth century was stunningly beautiful. Do a search on old demolished NY buildings, it it makes for depressing viewing.
We did the same thing in the UK with London Euston, the 60s have a lot to answer for.
Euston was not practical as it was too small.
Amazing building. A veritable Roman Temple to what the new age and technology of Railroads could accomplish.
*Modeled after the Roman Baths of Caracalla,*
*Old Penn Station is considered to be America's greatest Architectural loss.*
Fantastic video - WELL DONE 👍👍👍
When you look at what replaced Pennsylvania Station above ground level you realise the folly its destruction. The new use of the old Post Office building, however, is encouraging.
Another great video and the shots of 50s and earlier American trains are wonderful (especially the B&O). I've seen GCT and it lived up to it's billing as a magnificent structure even if the train only goes to Poughkeepsie now. I would have loved to have seen Penn Station in it's finery especially as the present station would give Birmingham New Street a run for the worst city station anywhere.
gosh, wat an amazing story/ doco. i really enjoyed it. thank you
The closest British answer to such an act of vandalism would be the destruction of the original London Euston (in particular the Euston Arch), London's Broad St & Glasgow St. Enoch (the original Subway station building is still with us, thank god).
In fact (to briefly deviate from Penn Station but in a similar vein), under what has become known as 'The Bruce Report' dating from 1945, the entirety of Glasgow City Centre was proposed to be flattened and completely remodelled. This would have involved the destruction of not only all 4 of Glasgow then-mainline railway terminal stations (Central, Queen St, Buchanan St & St. Enoch), but of the Glasgow City Chambers, Kelvingrove Art Gallery & Museum, the Glasgow School of Art, Glasgow University's Gilbert Scott building, among so many others. Such a radical plan was ultimately rejected on the grounds of cost, but then, as undoubtedly would be the case now, howls of public outrage at such a catastrophic act of vandalism would have played it's part in killing the idea of such a plan being implemented in full stone dead.
That didn't stop some aspects of the plan becoming reality in the 60s/70s (namely, St. Enoch & Buchanan St stations being flattened, an Orbital motorway was partially built at the cost of an entire district and two more districts were flattened and completely rebuilt, plus several of our historic buildings succumbing to fire, neglect or plain old disuse over the intervening decades). We are still paying the price for such short-sighted blunders today and will be for some time.
But I digress. Top work taking us through the station's history leading up to and including the most shameful blot on New York's history that is it's destruction. The last of these in this case is always hard to watch; a cursory glance at the comment section reveals I ain't alone in thinking that.
Luckily nowadays historic public stuctures are more and more loved and protected.
Those structures are more then just a building they define the soul of a country and culture.
Even some buildings who were once regarded as an eye sore in their time of construction ( Eifeltower Paris for example) have became iconic.
I'm a New Yorker born and raised and was a teenager when the new Penn Station/Madison Square Garden complex was built. Ugly edifice, as a kid I could never figure out why such an obviously "round" building was always called "square". I grew up without ever seeing a basketball game or a music concert in the Garden because the tickets were always scalped before I could get to the ticket booths. I remember vividly slovenly dressed young men whispering "smoke, smoke" in my ear as I rushed to my trains during my daily commutes. To be fair, I think the city has cleaned up the pushers since then, and the New York Landmarks Preservation Commission has been able to spare many other buildings from the wrecking ball citing Penn Station as a particularly blatant example of New York real estate run amok.
Excellent video. Thank you.
They keep putting off building new railroad tunnels under the Hudson River.
I may be wrong, but Amtrak currently serves Penn Station, but not the grander preserved Grand Central, which is used only for regional and commuter rail, right? That's unfortunate, since it means Penn Station is more important for long distance rail. I've been to a few stations in the US, among the nice old ones were Chicago Union Station, Los Angeles, and Philadelphia's 30th Street Station, which would be nicer if they'd give it a good cleanup, but Washington DC's Union Station might be the nicest one I've been too, giant waiting room, lots of marble and statues, pretty grand, plus it had lots of shops, restaurants, and a movie theater, and connected to Metro Rail, regional rail, and busses.
Up until CV there was a great need to new tunnels under the Hudson. There were plans that got nixed ten years ago. Now they were to be that and even more expanded. There was a great more influx of people using the terminal. All that though may be for naught. With business realizing they can do more work remotely. The whole reason for having office space in Manhattan is blown to smithereens. Right now Penn and much of NYC is pretty much a ghost town. A former Shadow of itself. Oh and Kaiser Wilhelm DeBlasio isn't making it any better.
@@RobertWilke The economic damage from CV hasn't been reckoned with. They're just printing and borrowing money to get through the election.
Thank you for this beautiful documentary!
A really good structured documentary with all the details of history. One thing that was bothering me and you should check out are the weird background noises during silent moments.
Excellent cover I have always mourned this architectural beauty. I feel better when I think about Westway was never built.
Years ago I walked through the old station, I remember thebig dark grey granite columns and thought it was gloomy, my boyfriend told me it was modeled on the Baths of Caracalla--- hard to keep those Roman emperors straight.
I'm from New York and it's true that building never should have been destroyed
I still cannot believe that they tore down this beautiful work of architecture to build the abysmal, depressing international style one on 34th St now. So maddening!
It's called erasing history.
Most of buildings like this were destroyed in WWII and the rest mysteriously went down in fire.
I'm surprised there wasn't any mention of the proposal to Rebuild Penn back to it's original glory, albeit with a modern touch like the taxiways being used as public arcades, the station being changed from a terminal to a through running station, and the removal of a number of the tracks so the platforms can be widened.
Previous website: www.rebuildpennstation.org/
Current website: www.rethinkpennstationnyc.org/
Website talking about the track level improvements: www.rethinknyc.org/rethinkpenn/
Excellent video about Penn Station Ruairidh, both with the way it was put together and the facts/statistics used in it. It was certainly a beautiful station before Madison Square Garden was built. Just one minor thing I wanted to point out that stood out to me. At 20:06, you mentioned that the Penn Central was formed in 1968 by the merger of the New York Central, Pennsylvania Railroad and the New Haven Railroad. That's not entirely true. In 1968, the Penn Central was formed as a merger between just the New York Central and the Pennsylvania Railroad. One year later, in 1969, the New Haven was absorbed into it. The New Haven was already bankrupt at that time and the Penn Central didn't even want it to become part of their system because of the bankruptcy the New Haven was in at that time.
I recall when it happened. It was considered a "Miracle of Progress." I imagine Euston station was treated the same way and look at it now.
Great video! A shame about the original Greyhound Bus Term.'s fate--a charming little building
Suddenly Euston arch doesn't seem like such a disaster!
I almost can't believe such a thing was real 😳
Look at the World Fair buildings.
We inherited a planet with some amazing lots civilisation's relics.
It’s such a shame the station was destroyed
3:55 Holy cow that logo is an eyesore.
7:11 definitely isn’t
My father was around long enough to use the old Penn Station and the hideous new one. He was bitter about the loss of the original his whole life.
I’m bitter about it even though it was demolished decades before I was even born.
I can’t imagine what they were thinking as they were taking sledgehammers to that incredible facade and pulling down the bronze sculptures. I personally couldn’t have been a worker on that site, I’d feel party to a crime.
As a lifelong west coast resident i feel this is a National tragedy!:-( 🖖
The video actually mistaken because if you go to the track levels at New York Penn Station you should see that the entire station complex is third rail and overhead wires.
Until fairly recently you could still see some of the original glass bricks and terrazzo flooring in the shop space that's now occupied by the KFC / Taco Bell / Pizza Hut on the north side of the main concourse.
I still think it's pretty wild that all of the LIRR Is 3rd rail...it would be so unbelievably expensive now. I believe that 3rd rail is like 4-6 times as expensive per mile compared to catenary electric
For water crossings, a tunnel is generally more costly to construct than a bridge. However, navigational considerations at some locations may limit the use of high bridges or drawbridge spans when crossing shipping channels, necessitating the use of a tunnel.
If its a short distance of less than a mile, on the average a bridge is much less expensive than a tunnel.
Damn shame !!!!Pennsylvania station should never have been allowed to be torn down !! Damn shame ...
I really enjoy your site. Thanks for doing an American building.
You leave the Pennsylvania station 'bout a quarter to four,
Read a magazine, and then you're in Baltimore,
Dinner in the Diner, nothing could be Finer,
Than to have your ham n eggs in Carolina.
Such glamour, and such beauty, from the days when men built things which really mattered. A wonderful video.
We had Euston, London's first intercity terminal, with its Doric arch and Great Hall, all destroyed around the same time, to be replaced by concrete bunkers. What a disgusting waste it all is.
And look what happened to Birmingham City Centre in the late 50s and 60s. It is said the city planners wrought far more destruction than the Luftwaffe did in 1941! And we get cloned soulless replacements, which thankfully are now going - the Library for one, but not sure its repalcement is that wondeful! Architects pah!
@@DrivermanO The Luftwaffe were mere ameteurs, compared to what came in the 60s and 70s. That era should be known as "The Devastation"
And in another echo from New York the finest station in London (St Pancras) would have also been destroyed but for the efforts of Sir John Betjemen. Could Grand Central Terminal and St Pancras both been lost as well as Penn Station and Euston - certainly possible and both cities would be the big losers if they had.
Really liked this , more please
Toronto almost lost its beautiful Beaux Arts train terminal, Union Station, in the 1970s, in a manner that paralleled the Penn Station experience. Only 50 years old at the time, it was to be torn down and replaced by a modernist multi-building redevelopment of the station precinct, of which only the CN Tower wound up being built. Happily, the station was saved through public pressure. It is now nearing the much-delayed completion of a $1 billion (Cdn) renovation and restoration, the busiest public transportation hub in Canada.
The biggest shot in the foot to the City of New York,
20:49 God, when I went there 2 years ago I thought that building was cool. I could never imagine an even more beautiful structure stood in front of it before... I don't even remember what the building on the other side of the road looks like
Its MSG on the other side.
@@SchroderPhotography Yeah, and I didn't remember it.
Excellent piece. Thanks.