It is perhaps symbolic of the multimillion-dollar restoration saga of Washington`s Union Station that gourmet restaurants are being built in what were once the terminal`s main men`s and ladies` rooms.
The creation of Chicago architect Daniel Burnham, this Beaux Arts palace of a railroad depot was completed in 1907 and reigned as one of the grander glories of the Republic for half a century. The harsh times that befell American railroading in the last generation drove it into deep decline, however, a fate compounded by feckless and costly federal
efforts to save it.
Now the federal government has joined with the private sector in an ambitious scheme not only to bring Union Station back to life as a railroad terminal but also as a glamorous commercial center. It`s costing taxpayers $110 million, and another $40 million is being invested by Chicago`s First National Bank.
Certainly these are, to use Burnham`s own words, ”no little plans.” But then, Union Station always has been regarded as the nation`s railroad depot. Chicago may have been the rail hub of the country, and New York`s Grand Central Station was where the stars posed with their luggage before boarding trains for the West Coast. But in the days before Air Force One, when American presidents went anywhere, they usually went via Union Station.
They didn`t have to pace the platform, either. They waited in the comforts of a multichambered Presidential Suite, which had its own entrance, silk-covered walls, parquet floors, Oriental rugs, electrified chandeliers and mahogany furniture.
The suite featured a 2,130-square-foot covered walls, parquet floors, Oriental rugs, electrified chandeliers and mahogany furniture.
The suite featured a 2,130-square-foot reception room where the president greeted heads of state and other visiting dignitaries. Nowadays this welcome usually is conducted on the often-cold and windy ramp of Andrews Air Force Base or the White House lawn.
And, of course, royal visitors were provided with a red carpet for their arrivals and departures. Among the crowned heads passing through the terminal were Queen Marie of Romania, King Albert of Belgium and King George VI of England.
Armies of soldiers, sailors and airmen poured through Union Station during and after America`s wars. During World War I, those who paused at the depot`s canteen could find themselves being served by President Wilson`s wife Edith and by a young Eleanor Roosevelt, whose husband was then assistant secretary of the navy. The body of Lt. Norman Prince, founder of the World War I American flying unit known as the Lafayette Escadrille, lay in state in the station`s reception room after the war.
In 1936 a dinner for 3,000 delegates from 50 nations attending the Third World Power Conference in Washington was held in the station`s main waiting room. Everything from the furnishings to the silverware was brought down from New York`s Waldorf Astoria hotel by train.
Union Station was a featured player in countless movies. When Mr. Smith came to Washington, he didn`t go through National Airport.
When it and its track approaches were built-at a then-staggering cost of $25 million-the terminal became the largest building (in ground space occupied) in the United States and the biggest train station in the world. At its prime, it employed more than 5,000 people. Aside from the usual amenities, it could provide travelers with a doctor, hospital, mortuary, butcher, baker, police station, Turkish bath, swimming pool, bowling alley, basketball court and silver monogramming shop.
Financier J.P. Morgan was among the many who departed the station in private trains. On one journey to New York in 1911, Morgan set a world record, completing the 226-mile rail distance in 3 hours, 55 minutes.
In 1953 passengers on the inbound Federal Express got more ride than they bargained for when the runaway train roared over the end-of-the-track bumper, through a newsstand and into the main concourse. The station floor collapsed beneath the enormous weight of the locomotive, but no one was killed.
In 1968, when the Bicentennial of the United States was approaching, Congress voted to convert most of the station premises to a National Visitors Center. Lawmakers noted correctly that railroad operations, which had seen the station host to 156 trains a day in its prime, would diminish dramatically.
But the visitors` center was an instant failure because most tourists came to Washington by bus, car and plane-not train. And because the center was so far from some of the things tourists came to see: the museums along the Mall, the White House, the Washington Monument and the Lincoln, Jefferson and (later) Vietnam War Memorials.
The Visitors Center`s meager attractions included a 175-seat movie theater, a government bookstore, an exhibit on First Ladies, a Hall of States (which consisted mostly of flags) and an information desk staffed by National Park Service rangers who could answer questions in a few foreign languages. The centerpiece was an 8,000-square-foot sunken ”Primary Audio-Visual Experience,” more aptly called ”the Pit,” in which visitors could watch a large but dull sort of patriotic movie. Costing $1.6 million, ”the pit” was closed two years after it opened.
The cost of converting and maintaining the Visitors Center reached $45 million and kept going, while visitors stayed away in the same huge numbers in which they`d been predicted to come. The roof began to leak, causing plaster to fall. Pipes burst, pools of water formed, and toadstools and other fungi grew on walls and floors. Vagrants began using its recesses to the point that it began to resemble one big restroom. Rats and roaches proliferated. At one point, street people led by Mitch Snyder of the Community for Creative Non-Violence attempted to take it over as a permanent residence.
In 1979 members of the House Public Works Committee were condemning the center as ”a blight on the community,” ”practically useless,” ”an eyesore” and ”this turkey.” The members then voted to spend another $39 million to refurbish the Visitors Center and station, after Rep. Elliott Levitas of Georgia argued: ”We must either finish it or leave it as a monument to how bad government can be.”
Cost overrun after cost overrun followed delay after delay. Ultimately the center closed, and in 1981 Congress voted to make Union Station a railroad terminal again. It took five years to put the deal together, but ground was broken in 1986. Completion is scheduled for September.
The development team includes Chicago`s LaSalle Partners and the Baltimore firm Williams Jackson Ewing Inc., whose principals formerly were with the Rouse Co., responsible for the brilliant success of Boston`s Faneuil Hall Marketplace and other much-praised restorations.
Benjamin Thompson Associates of Boston, architects for such equally acclaimed creations as Baltimore`s Harbor Place, New York`s South Street Seaport and San Francisco`s Ghiradelli Square, is doing the design work on the commercial portion of Union Station. The architect for actual restoration of the terminal to its Edwardian-era glory is Chicago`s Harry Weese, to many the uncrowned heir to Daniel Burnham.
The plan calls for restoring the Beaux Arts grandeur of the station to the point where Teddy Roosevelt would feel at home (though he might be put out that there are no more trains to places like Lincoln, Neb.). Employing highly skilled workers and modern-day restoration techniques, developers are seeing to every detail, from the gold leaf on the ceiling coffers to the faux marble of the huge columns in the station`s East Hall. Sculptures personifying Fire, Electricity, Agriculture and Mechanics and depicting 36 Roman legionnaires around the main balcony are being brought back to perfection.
More than 100 retail stores will fill the commercial areas. The terminal`s five new major restaurants are going into what were its main men`s and women`s restrooms, its old baggage room and lunchroom, and (as Teddy Roosevelt probably would not have appreciated) into the former Presidential Suite.
On the lower level will be a nine-screen 2,000-seat cinema complex, which is expected to draw about 750,000 people a year to the station.
The developers are counting on tapping not only numbers such as these but also 6- to 9 million people who annually pass through or near the terminal via Amtrak, the local subway and other public transportation. The finished product also will have a 1,200-car parking garage.
The station is a short walk to the U.S. Capitol, and the neighborhood rapidly is becoming government-oriented, with lots of private money going into new office buildings for lobbying firms, think tanks and other appendages to government. It would fill a need for the trendy and rapidly expanding Capitol Hill neighborhood beyond, which long has lacked adequate shopping and a commercial focus.
The question for the developers, Chicago investors and taxpayers remains whether such a project can succeed without the physical attraction of a body of water, as in similar Boston, Baltimore and New York projects, or without a major department store. The phenomenal success of Chicago`s Oak Brook shopping plaza and suburban Virginia`s Tyson`s Corner mall would not have been possible without such a department store.
Most of those concerned, such as Sally Oldham, vice president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, are optimistic about the station`s resurrection. She noted that similar railroad depot re-developments have worked remarkably well in downtown Indianapolis, Nashville and St. Louis, as well as in smaller towns in upstate New York and Colorado.
The project is intended to become self-sustaining, commercial rents paying off the investment. If it fails, it undoubtedly will fall back into the laps of the Congress-and the taxpayers.
But one hopes not. As restorers make clearer with each passing day, the station is far too majestic to be a monument simply to government.
