An often-covered story, but with some new insights by Michael Beschloss in the New York Times – and a rarely seen photo of the demolition of New York’s Pennsylvania Station.
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Penn Station: A Place That Once Made Travelers Feel Important
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If you don’t enjoy arriving in or departing from New York City through the squalid cavern known as Pennsylvania Station, you can blame — at least for a start — the desperate executives, short on public spirit, who tried to prop up the money-losing Pennsylvania Railroad in the 1950s.
During that decade of new interstate highways and commercial jets — all aided by various forms of public spending — the railroad’s managers became convinced that passenger train travel was in permanent decline. So in the mid-1950s, they decided to sell air rights to the eight acres between Seventh and Eighth Avenues and 31st and 33rd Streets, where the costly-to-maintain old Penn Station stood.
The asking price was about $50 million (equal to about $440 million today), and their decision led to the demolition of one of the crown jewels of New York’s civic and architectural heritage.
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The demolition of Penn Station in the early 1960s. In the background, the James A. Farley Post Office, also designed by McKim, Mead & White, is viewed as a successor, though plans have moved slowly
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In 1968, the railroad merged with the New York Central to become Penn Central, which went bankrupt within two years.
Happily, the loss of Penn Station stimulated public institutions devoted to historic preservation, along with stricter rules and more intense citizen activism in New York and elsewhere. This made it easier to save Grand Central Terminal when it was endangered in the mid-1970s.
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For the full glory of the vanished Penn Station, go here. Finally, this image – as tragic as one can find to capture the loss of Penn Station, and the banality of the mid-century corporate culture that trashed this artistic heritage.
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A famous photograph by Eddie Hausner of the ruined sculpture “Day” in a landfill of the New Jersey Meadowlands
Painful to see this great loss.
The same thing happened in Vancouver. Nearly all the grand theatres along Hastings Street were torn down and in some cases replaced by nothing at all. One of them spent 50 years as a vacant lot. Finally when the Birks Building was pulled down people sat up and took notice. But by then we’d lost the 2nd Hotel Vancouver and dozens of other gems of early Vancouver. The replacement of Birks with the downtown London Drugs was a turning point that led to many preservations in the decades that followed. Even so we failed to protect the last of the old Hastings theatres, the Pantages, and it was finally demolished after years of neglect destroyed most of its value.
Side note: Birks occupied the corner in the new Vancouver Centre development (they weren’t “forced out” and certainly not by London Drugs). Birks eventually decided to move to the heritage former CIBC bank at Granville & Hastings, at which time it was replaced by Bollum’s Books (which went bankrupt), then by Duthie Books (which went bankrupt), then London Drugs (and the corner is far more active now than it was with Birks (Vancouver Centre version) or either of the book stores.
Thanks for the clarification. My intention was to let people know what currently occupies the location so they could picture the corner.
Georgia and Granville has always been a vibrant corner. Foncie had his camera in the area for decades because it was the place to be, but I don’t have personal memories of Georgia & Granville in the 60s or 70s because my parents shopped at Woodward’s.
There is a foncie picture of my grandma pulling my dad along Granville from the forties, I think 8) ooh, this post breaks my heart but it echoes how I feel about the wanton destruction here of things from another time. It’s almost as though everything New wants to destroy everything old so as not to be held up to the same standard. Interestingly enough, in the skyscraper page article it shows the statute “night” rescued in Brooklyn and says the whereabouts of “day” are unknown, maybe not making the connection between her and the broken angel in the new jersey landfill. :'(
THE LAST PICTURE at the Jersey Meadows is the coda of the Pennsylvania Railraod splendor. The statue face down while a Pennsy (or Penn Central or Amtrak) train, imperturbable in the background continuning it’s mission. This was a real murder for money $$$$$$$$$$$
Vancouver ought to inventory buildings (or even single family houses) worth saving/restoring/subsidizing. There are a few, but not many as the city has only about a 100 year history. Peanuts compared to Europe or Asia with 2000+ years in many cases.
Some buildings were icons at its time. Some of them are worth keeping. Many are not. Some facades can be integrated into new buildings.