In 1963, America learned a painful lesson when Pennsylvania Station, an architectural treasure that Senator Daniel Moynihan described as “the best thing in our city,” was torn down and replaced with a dreary complex that includes an office building and Madison Square Garden. The rail station, to this day the nation’s busiest, was moved underground into a claustrophobic warren of artificially lit passageways and bleak waiting rooms. While there has been an active campaign since the 1990’s to rectify the mistake by creating a new and worthy station a block away, the $1 billion-plus project remains stuck in political gridlock.

 

But the sad saga of Penn was by no means an isolated incident. Almost like a rite of passage, cities across the country embraced the era of Interstates, Big Macs, and suburban sprawl by tearing down their train depots. (Frequently, they just did the Joni Mitchell thing and put up a parking lot.) But time and experience are showing that train stations are vital organs in a healthy city, and removing them deadens the entire organism. The lesson is especially stark at the moment, as cities around the country face the challenge of rebuilding the infrastructure for regional high speed rail networks. Chicago–once abundantly blessed with grand stations–is today bouncing around ideas for a new high speed rail depot.

One lesson of this legacy is that what replaces a well designed and centrally located rail depot is rarely of equal worth to the city. Following is a tour of 10 great depots that were lost to demolition orders–plus one more that might be still–and what stands on those sites today.

1. NEW YORK CITY: PENNSYLVANIA STATION

 

THEN: “The best thing in our city,” according to Sen. Daniel Moynihan

WHAT’S THERE NOW: The new Penn Station is a dingy labyrinth beneath an ugly arena

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2. MEMPHIS – UNION STATION

When this city’s Union Station opened in 1912, it was the largest stone structure in town. But when the U.S. Postal Service announced that it needed new land in the city in the late 1960s, the magnificent building was chosen for demolition because it no longer attracted the crowds that it had once brought into the city. Any interest in saving the structure itself was ignored.

These days Memphis is expressing interest in being part of the Southeast High Speed Rail Corridor.

THEN: A grand Beaux Arts depot for a thriving city

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WHAT’S THERE NOW: A windowless postal facility surrounded by barbed wire

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3. ATLANTA – TERMINAL STATION

Atlanta was once the largest rail crossroads in the south. Travelers could get virtually everywhere quickly and conveniently by rail. Built in 1905, Terminal was the grand portal to the city. It had two Italianate towers and a huge train shed behind. When the station was razed in 1970, it was replaced by a government office building. These days Atlanta’s intercity rail depot is a small former commuter rail station located far north of downtown, adjacent to a 16-lane highway.

Recently, Georgia governor Sonny Perdue–after scouting the passenger rail systems in Spain and China–has enthusiastically embraced the idea of a high speed rail network for the southeastern US. Of course, Atlanta would be a network hub–and very likely in need of a suitable depot.

THEN: A fitting portal to a regional capital

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NOW: A government office building

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4. BIRMINGHAM, AL – TERMINAL STATION

In 1909, Birmingham opened its grand Terminal Station, which united the train services of six operators. The two block-long Byzantine-styled complex had 10 tracks, and when opened was the largest of its kind in the South.

Yet this station — which served a peak of 54 trains a day in 1943 — by 1969 only was seeing seven daily arrivals. As a result, the city chose to demolish the structure that year. Although the land was originally intended for a new federal building, a highway was built there instead.

Today, Birmingham is slated as a primary stop on the designated high speed rail corridorlinking New Orleans and Atlanta.

THEN: An impressive and centrally located depot

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NOW: A connector highway

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5. CHICAGO: GRAND CENTRAL STATION

Perhaps more than any other American city, Chicago’s destiny has been a result of its transportation links to the rest of the country. As such, it had something of an abundance of train stations. Even while it still has four commuter terminals inside the Loop, knocking down impressive stations like Grand Central did not yield much for the city. The site of this former station, prime real estate on the banks of the Illinois River, is still a vacant lot after nearly four decades.

THEN: Located on the banks of the Chicago River, the beautiful station with ornate marble floors, Corinthian columns, and a fireplace. It served travelers to DC and many other cities.

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NOW: A vacant lot

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6. CHICAGO: CENTRAL STATION

This 13-story Romanesque structure was built in 1893 and demolished eight decades later. Like former Grand Central, the site remains undeveloped to this day.

THEN: A well-designed depot in the heart of downtown on the shore of Lake Michigan(Pic)

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NOW: Undeveloped land at the edge of Grant Park

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7. ROCHESTER: NY CENTRAL RAILROAD STATION

Rochester’s principal train station opened in 1914, with New York Central Railroad connections to New York, Albany, and Buffalo. The elaborate curved brick exterior made a prominent mark on downtown. But the decline in passenger traffic emptied the station by the late 1950s, and the building was razed in 1965. In its place? A parking lot.

THEN: A local architectural triumph and an important part of the local infrastructure

NOW: A parking lot and an unappealing Amtrak facility

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8. ATLANTA: UNION STATION

After being built in 1930, the smaller of Atlanta’s train depots was demolished in 1972.

THEN: A centrally-located secondary depot serving a large city

NOW: A parking lot

(Pic)
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9. BOSTON – NORTH STATION

Boston completed its Union Station in 1895, but tore it down only thirty years later to build the Boston Garden basketball arena. Which is to say, the city lost a beautiful neoclassical structure for its train services, replacing it instead with a basement of a stadium. When the Garden itself was demolished for a new arena in 1995–the mellifluously-named TD BankNorth Garden–North Station was renewed as an underground facility (still, sadly, not directly linked to the city’s larger South Station). While it’s easy to pick on the new Garden’s bland design, the new building is at least a vital and economically productive part of the city’s fabric. The fact that North Station fell so long ago, might have something to do with this.

THEN: An important portal for commuter and intercity rail travelers traveling to or from points north

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NOW: The new Garden and an underground rail station

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10. SAVANNAH: UNION STATION

Completed in 1902, the Savannah Union Station stood on the west end of downtown with its two Spanish Renaissance towers marking its presence on the historic city’s skyline. For blacks in the city, Union Station was the center of life. All that changed, however, in 1963 when building the depot and much of the neighborhood around it was bulldozed to make way for the tail end of an Interstate.

If Gov. Sonny Perdue gets his way, Savannah will someday reclaim its rail heritage and become a stop on an HSR link between Atlanta and Jacksonville.

THEN: An attractive and well-used depot in the center of town

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NOW: Feeder ramps at the tail end of a highway

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11. DETROIT – MICHIGAN CENTRAL STATION

Unlike the other stations on this list, Michigan Central is still standing. But if the Detroit city council gets its way the station, which was the 1912 encore act by the same team of architects that designed NYC’s Grand Central (itself almost a victim of the wrecking ball until the US Supreme Court intervened in 1978), will be demolished. Ironically, the city council wants to use funds from the stimulus act–the same piece of legislation that provided $8 billion to begin building a high speed rail network–to do the dirty work on Michigan Central.

Though it has suffered two decades of vandalism and disuse, the depot remains well worth saving. With a bit of imagination it could be part of Detroit’s future as a hub on the Midwest regional HSR network.

THEN AND NOW: The building was the second act of the architects who designed NYC’s Grand Central Terminal. But will it be demolished now as Grand Central almost was in the ’70s (even years after the epic mistake of tearing down Penn)?

Whether you love ‘em or hate ‘em, highways are a fact of life in America and will remain so for a long time to come. That being the case, building and maintaining our automotive byways will continue to be a huge business (and one, we might note, that’s not vulnerable to outsourcing). Just this year the stimulus provided $28 billion for construction work on roads and bridges, and in coming months the new transportation bill–estimated size: $450 billion–will fatten the pot even more.

But while most of us are familiar with the major players in other big industries, how many Americans can name even one company that builds roads? Well, to improve our national infrastructural literacy, here’s a primer on the 10 biggest highway builders in the US (based on revenue rankings from Engineering News Record). The revenue figures cited are specifically for road construction work, and many cases represent only a portion of a given company’s overall business.

This is the first of a series of “industry tours” we’ll be taking to look at who’s doing the work–and making the money–on America’s infrastructure.

10 – Clark Group – $305 million
Among this firm’s most notable projects were the design and construction of six high-capacity interchanges on Route 28 in northern Virginia and the $185 million project to improve one of Washington state’s major traffic bottlenecks by adding two HOV lanes on a busy stretch of I-5.

Though it started out as a small excavating company in 1906, Clark is today one of the largest general contractors in the US. The Maryland company’s diverse operating divisions span from building high-tech laboratories to baseball stadiums.

9 – American Infrastructure – $315 million 
In 2006, this heavy engineering and building materials supplier received an “Excellence in Construction Award” for its work on Maryland’s Route 43, which included building 3.8 miles of new four-lane divided highway. AI also completed the challenge of widening I-276 in Pennsylvania from four to six lanes to accommodate over 60,000 daily commuters and multiple freight and passenger rail carriers.

The company was founded in 1939 and is still own by the same family. It got some recent media attention as the recipient of the government’s first stimulus contract.

8 – New Enterprise Stone & Lime – $330 million
This construction materials supplier and road builder has completed many ambitious bypass projects, including one in Loysburg, PA.

The firm is headquartered in Pennsylvania and owned by the third and fourth generations of the Detwiler family, which founded it in 1924. It’s subsidiaries specialize in different activities ranging from operating limestone quarries to developing technology solutions for highways.

7 – Flatiron Construction Corp. – $340 million 
Currently, this company is working on the 6.8-mile “Washington Bypass” highway project in North Carolina that involves building a bridge over the Pamlico-Tar River. For this, the company is using a new patent-pending construction technique that reduces environmental damage. Flatiron also proudly completed Orange County’s $803 million Eastern Transportation Corridor–a 25.4-mile limited-access toll road–below budget and more than a year ahead of schedule.

The company is headquartered in Denver and is wholly owned by the Netherlands-based Royal BAM Group, one of the largest construction firms in the world.

6 – Jacobs Engineering – $365 million 
While this technical services firm gets most of its revenue from the energy sector, it also has extensive infrastructure operations. For example, it received a contract from the North Texas Tollway Authority to design a multi-levelinterchange in McKinney with an estimated cost of $200 million. Jacobs also signed a deal in January to provide engineering and environmental services for approximately 24 miles of roadway in Stanislaus County, CA.

The publicly-traded company has annual revenues exceeding $11 billion, more than 46,000 employees, and more than 160 offices in more than 20 countries.

5 – The Hubbard Group – $430 million 
Last year, the company began work on the $89 million Orlando-Orange County Expressway Authority 414 project, including new road work and bridge construction. It was also awarded a 6.3-mile, $102 million project in North Carolina which included the construction of a major interchange at I-85 and seven box culverts.

The Hubbard Group is a holding company comprised of two heavy construction firms in the southeastern United States: Hubbard Construction based in Florida and Blythe Construction in North Carolina. It is, in turn, part of Eurovia, a European developer of roads and highways.

4 – The Lane Construction Corp. – $770 million 
One of Lane’s biggest current gigs is the reconstruction and widening of I-64, from an existing four lane divided highway to a six lane divided highway. The company is also the lead contractor for the reconstruction and upgrade of 2 miles of the existing Route 17 through Horseheads, NY into a new section of I-86.

The private firm, founded in 1890 and based in Connecticut, was a pioneer in using “macadamized pavements”–a predecessor to today’s asphalt–to build new roads in the northeast as they came into greater demand with the expanding use of the automobile.

3. Kiewit Corporation – $850 million 
Among this company’s most notable projects are a $1.28 billion Colorado contract (the state’s largest ever) to improve I-25 and I-225 and the construction of the 91 Express Lanes in Orange Country, CA. The latter project is the world´s first fully automated toll road; it was built in a privately financed deal worth $126 million.

Employee-owned Kiewit has built more than 1,800 transportation projects in the past 15 years, totaling more than $23 billion in contract revenue–this includes more lane-miles in interstate, highways, and bridges than any other contractor.

2. The Walsh Group Ltd. – $1.1 billion 
Walsh is taking the lead on the $500 million reconstruction of Dan Ryan Expressway in Chicago and recently completed a design-build project on Indiana’s I-65 highway.

The Illinois-based company, still family owned, has practiced general building construction since its founding in 1898. It provides services through its subsidiaries, Walsh Construction and Archer Western Contractors.

1 – Granite Construction – $1.2 billion 
This firm is building the controversial Maryland Intercounty Connector and and has signed a deal to do improvement work on I-64 in St. Louis. Each deal of these deals is worth more than $400 million dollars.

The California company touts its history of building the first roads through Yosemite National Park as well as major segments of the federal interstate highway system.

Eduardo Hernandez, the author of this piece, is a recent graduate of the University of Pennsylvania where he wrote his thesis on infrastructure policy. He is the founder of the reference site Wikinfrastructure.info.