Union Station (Washington, D.C.)

For the Washington Metro station, see Union Station (Washington Metro).

Union Station
Amtrak, MARC, and VRE railway station
Location	50 Massachusetts Avenue NE Washington, DC United States
Coordinates
Owned by	Amtrak and USDOT. Union Station Redevelopment Corp. leased to Ashkenazy Acquisition Corporation
Operated by	Jones Lang LaSalle
Platforms	18
Tracks	22
Train operators	Amtrak, MARC, VRE
Bus stands	located on the mezzanine level
Bus operators	WMATA Metrobus DC Circulator Maryland MTA Commuter Bus Loudoun County Commuter Bus PRTC Buses BoltBus Greyhound Lines Megabus Peter Pan Bus Lines Washington Deluxe Best Bus
Connections	Washington Metro Red Line at Union Station, DC Streetcar
Construction
Parking	2,448
Bicycle facilities	180
Disabled access	Yes
Other information
Station code	Amtrak code: WAS IATA code: ZWU
Fare zone	1(VREX)
History
Opened	1908
Rebuilt	1981–1989
Traffic
Passengers (2015)	4,971,128 annually  1.1% (Amtrak)
Passengers (2014)	32,465 daily  1.55% (Metro)
Services
Preceding station   Amtrak   Following station Terminus Acela Express BWI Airport toward Boston South Station Vermonter New Carrollton toward St. Albans Rockville toward Chicago Capitol Limited Terminus Alexandria toward Chicago Cardinal Baltimore toward New York City Alexandria toward Charlotte Carolinian Alexandria toward New Orleans Crescent Alexandria toward Savannah Palmetto Alexandria toward Miami Silver Meteor Silver Star Alexandria toward Norfolk, Newport News, or Lynchburg Northeast Regional New Carrollton toward Boston South Station or Springfield MARC Silver Spring toward Martinsburg or Frederick Brunswick Line Terminus Terminus Camden Line Riverdale toward Camden Station Penn Line New Carrollton toward Perryville Virginia Railway Express L'Enfant toward Broad Run Manassas Line Terminus L'Enfant toward Spotsylvania Fredericksburg Line   Proposed service   Preceding station   Transdominion Express   Following station Alexandria toward Bristol Washington-Bristol Line Terminus   Former services   Baltimore and Ohio Silver Spring (Metropolitan Branch) toward Chicago Grand Central Station Main Line Hyattsville (Washington Branch) toward Baltimore Mount Royal Station Pennsylvania Railroad Terminus Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad Landover toward Philadelphia
Washington D.C. Union Station
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
Built	1908
Architect	D.H. Burnham & Company (William Pierce Anderson, Daniel Burnham)
Architectural style	Classical, Beaux-Arts, among others
NRHP Reference #	69000302
Designated	March 24, 1969

Union Station is a major train station, transportation hub, and leisure destination in Washington, D.C. Opened in 1907, it is Amtrak's headquarters and the railroad's second-busiest station, with annual ridership of over 5 million. The station also serves MARC and VRE commuter rail services, the Washington Metro, and buses.

At the height of its traffic, during World War II, as many as 200,000 people passed through in a single day. In 1988, a headhouse wing was added and the original station renovated for use as a shopping mall. Today, Union Station is one of the busiest rail facilities and shopping destinations in the country, and is visited by over 40 million people a year.

History

Predecessor terminals

Before Union Station opened, each of the major railroads operated their own stations: Baltimore and Ohio Railroad trains arrived and departed from the New Jersey Avenue Station, while the Baltimore and Potomac Railroad (a subsidiary of the Pennsylvania Railroad) operated from its own station at 6th and B Street, NW—the current location of the National Gallery of Art.

Construction, opening, and operation

A 1902 drawing of a proposal for the design of Union Station

Trains at the station shortly after its completion, circa 1908

Train concourse, circa 1915

When the Pennsylvania Railroad and the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad announced in 1901 that they had agreed to build a new union station together, the city had two reasons to celebrate. The decision meant that both railroads would soon remove their trackwork and terminals from the National Mall. Though changes there appeared only gradually, the consolidation of the depots allowed the creation of the Mall as it appears today. Secondly, the plan to bring all the city's railroads under one roof promised that Washington would finally have a station both large enough to handle large crowds and impressive enough to befit the city's role as the federal capital. The station was to be designed under the guidance of Daniel Burnham, a famed Chicago architect and member of the U.S. Senate Park Commission, who in September 1901 wrote to the Commission's chairman, Sen. James McMillan, of the proposed project: "The station and its surroundings should be treated in a monumental manner, as they will become the vestibule of the city of Washington, and as they will be in close proximity to the Capitol itself."

After two years of complicated and sometimes contentious negotiations, Congress passed S. 4825 (58th-1st session) entitled "An Act to provide a union railroad station in the District of Columbia" which was signed into law by President Theodore Roosevelt on February 28, 1903. The Act authorized the Washington Terminal Company (which was to be jointly owned by the B&O and the PRR-controlled Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington Railroad) to construct a station “monumental in character” that would cost at least $4 million. (The main station building's actual cost eventually exceeded $5.9 million.) Including additional outlays for new terminal grades, approaches, bridges, viaducts, coach and freight yards, tunnels, shops, support buildings and other infrastructure, the total cost to the Terminal Company for all the improvements associated with Union Station exceeded $16 million. This cost was financed by $12 million in first mortgage bonds as well as advances by the owners which were repaid by stock and cash. Each carrier also received $1.5 million in government funding to compensate them for the costs of eliminating grade crossings in the city. The site selected to build the station was a district referred to as "Swampoodle" located half a mile north of the Capitol which was then a particularly noxious combination of boggy ground interspersed with slum dwellings. The only railroad station in the nation specifically authorized by Congress, the building was primarily designed by William Pierce Anderson of the Chicago architectural firm of D.H. Burnham & Company.

The first B&O train to arrive with passengers was the Pittsburgh Express which did so at 6:50 a.m. on October 27, 1907 while the first PRR train arrived three weeks later on November 17. The main building itself was completed in 1908. Of its 32 station tracks, 20 enter from the northeast and terminate at the station's headhouse. The remaining 12 tracks enter below ground level from the south via a 4,033-foot twin-tube tunnel passing under Capitol Hill and a 898-foot long subway under Massachusetts Avenue which allow through traffic direct access to the rail networks both north and south of the city.

U.S.O. Lounge (former Presidential Suite)

Among the new station's unique features was an opulent "Presidential Suite" (aka "State Reception Suite") where the U.S. President, State Department, and Congressional leaders could receive distinguished visitors arriving in Washington. Provided with a separate entrance, the suite (which was first used by President William Howard Taft in 1909) was also meant to safeguard the Chief Executive during his travels in an effort to prevent a repeat of the 1881 assassination of President James A. Garfield in the Baltimore & Potomac station. The suite was converted in December 1941 to a U.S.O. canteen, which went on to serve 6.5 million service members during World War II. Although closed on May 31, 1946, it was reopened in 1951 as a U.S.O. lounge and dedicated by President Harry Truman as a permanent "home away from home" for traveling U.S. armed service members.

On the morning of January 15, 1953, the Pennsylvania Railroad's Federal, the overnight train from Boston, crashed into the station. When the engineer tried to apply the trainline brakes two mis out of the platforms, he discovered that he only had engine brakes. He radioed a warning ahead, and the concourse was cleared as the train coasted downhill into track 16. The GG1 locomotive, No. 4876, hit the bumper block at about 25 miles per hour (40 km/h), jumped onto the platform, destroyed the stationmaster’s office at the end of the track, took out a newsstand, and was on its way to crashing through the wall into the Great Hall. Just then, the floor of the terminal, having never been designed to carry the weight of a locomotive, gave way, dropping the engine into the basement. The electric locomotive fell into about the center of what is now the food court. Remarkably, no one was killed, and passengers in the rear cars thought that they had only had a rough stop. An investigation revealed that an anglecock on the brakeline had been closed, probably by an icicle knocked from an overhead bridge. The accident inspired the finale of the 1976 film Silver Streak. The durable design of the GG1 made its damage repairable, and it was soon back in service after being hauled away in pieces to the PRR's main shops in Altoona, Pennsylvania. Before the latter action was undertaken, however, the GG1 and the hole it made were temporarily planked over and hidden from view due to the imminent inauguration of General Dwight D. Eisenhower as the thirty-fourth President of the United States.

Until intercity passenger rail service was taken over by Amtrak in 1971, Union Station served as a hub for the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, Pennsylvania Railroad, and Southern Railway. The Richmond, Fredericksburg & Potomac Railroad provided a link to Richmond, Virginia, about 100 miles (161 km) to the south, where major north-south lines of the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad and Seaboard Air Line Railroad provided service to the Carolinas, Georgia, and Florida. World War II was the busiest period in the station's history in terms of passenger traffic with up to 200,000 people passing through on a single day.

Decline

See also: National Visitor Center

South entrance, 1974

In 1967, the chairman of the Civil Service Commission expressed interest in using Union Station as a visitor center during the upcoming Bicentennial celebrations. Funding for this was collected over the next six years, and the reconstruction of the station included outfitting the Main Hall with a recessed pit to display a slide show presentation. This was officially the PAVE (Primary Audio-Visual Experience), but was sarcastically referred to as "the Pit". The entire project was completed, save for the parking garage, and opening ceremonies were held on Independence Day 1976. Due to a lack of publicity and convenient parking, the National Visitor Center was never popular. Following a 1977 General Accounting Office report indicating Union Station was in danger of imminent structural collapse, the National Park Service closed the presentation in "the Pit" on October 28, 1978.

Restoration

As a result of the Redevelopment Act of 1981, Union Station was closed for restoration and refurbishing. Mold was growing in the leaking ceiling of the Main Hall, and the carpet laid out for an Inauguration Day celebration was full of cigarette-burned holes. In 1988, Secretary of Transportation Elizabeth Dole awarded $70 million to the restoration effort. "The Pit" was transformed into a new basement level, and the Main Hall floor was refitted with marble. While installing new HVAC systems, crews discovered antique items in shafts that had not been opened since the building's creation.

The station reopened in its present form on September 29, 1988. The former “Pit” area was replaced with an AMC movie theater (later Phoenix Theatres), closed October 12, 2009, to be replaced with additional restaurants and a large food court in the former baggage-mail level. The food court still retains the original arches under which the trains were parked as well as the track numbers on those arches. A variety of shops opened along the Concourse and Main Hall, and a new Amtrak terminal at the back behind the original Concourse. Trains no longer enter the original Concourse but the original, decorative gates were relocated to the new passenger concourse. In 1994, this new passenger concourse was renamed to honor W. Graham Claytor, Jr., who served as Amtrak's president from 1982 to 1993. The decorative elements of the station were also restored. The skylights were preserved but sunlight no longer illuminates the Concourse because it is blocked by the newer roof structure built directly overhead to support the aging, original structure.

Architecture

The central interior of Union Station

Architect Daniel H. Burnham, assisted by Pierce Anderson, was inspired by a number of architectural styles. Classical elements included the Arch of Constantine (exterior, main façade) and the great vaulted spaces of the Baths of Diocletian (interior); prominent siting at the intersection of two of Pierre L'Enfant's avenues, with an orientation that faced the United States Capitol just five blocks away; a massive scale, including a façade stretching more than 600 ft (180 m) and a waiting room ceiling 96 ft (29 m) above the floor; stone inscriptions and allegorical sculpture in the Beaux-Arts style; expensive materials such as marble, gold leaf, and white granite from a previously unused quarry.

In the Attic block, above the main cornice of the central block, stand six colossal statues (modeled on the Dacian prisoners of the Arch of Constantine) created by Louis St. Gaudens. These are entitled "The Progress of Railroading" and their iconography expresses the confident enthusiasm of the American Renaissance movement: Prometheus (for Fire), Thales (for Electricity), Themis (for Freedom and Justice), Apollo (for Imagination and Inspiration), Ceres (for Agriculture) and Archimedes (for Mechanics). The substitution of Agriculture for Commerce in a railroad station iconography vividly conveys the power of a specifically American lobbying bloc. St. Gaudens also created the 26 centurions for the station's main hall.

Burnham drew upon a tradition, launched with the 1837 Euston railway station in London, of treating the entrance to a major terminal as a triumphal arch. He linked the monumental end pavilions with long arcades enclosing loggias in a long series of bays that were vaulted with the lightweight fireproof Guastavino tiles favored by American Beaux-Arts architects. The final aspect owed much to the Court of Heroes at the World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893 in Chicago, where Burnham had been coordinating architect. The setting of Union Station’s façade at the focus of converging avenues in a park-like green setting is one of the few executed achievements of the City Beautiful movement: elite city planning that was based on the "goosefoot" (patte d'oie) of formal garden plans made by Baroque designers such as André Le Nôtre.

The station held a full range of dining rooms and other services, including barber shops and a mortuary. Union Station was equipped with a presidential suite which is now occupied by a restaurant.

Services

A food court at Union Station in February 2006.

The interior of Union Station in August 2002.

Today Union Station is again one of Washington's busiest and best-known places, visited by 40 million people each year and has many shops, cafes, and restaurants.

Passenger services include Amtrak’s high-speed Acela Express, Northeast Regional, and several of Amtrak's long-distance sleeper trains (including, among others, the Capitol Limited, Crescent, Palmetto, and Silver Service trains); the MARC and VRE commuter railways, linking Washington to Maryland and West Virginia (MARC) and Virginia (VRE); and the Washington Metro Red Line. From Union Station, Amtrak also operates long-distance service to the Southeast and Midwest, including many intermediate stops to destinations such as Chicago, Atlanta, New Orleans, and Miami. In fiscal 2011, an average of more than 13,000 passengers boarded or got off Amtrak trains each day. It is also Amtrak's busiest train station that can handle the railroad's Superliner railcars.

The station is at the southern end of the Northeast Corridor, an electrified rail line extending north through major cities including Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York City, and Boston.

The track area of the station is divided into upper and lower levels. The upper level contains tracks 7–20 (tracks 1-6 no longer exist), which are served by high-level bay platforms at the door level of most trains. These tracks are used by all MARC commuter rail services on weekdays, all Amtrak Acela Express trains, and some Amtrak Northeast Regional trains that terminate at the station. All of the tracks on the upper level terminate at the station and are only used by trains arriving from and departing to the north.

The lower level contains tracks 22–29, which are served by low-level platforms at the track level. These platforms are served by all VRE trains, all Amtrak long-distance trains that serve the station except for the Capitol Limited, and some Amtrak Northeast Regional trains that are continuing south to Virginia. Unlike the tracks on the upper level, the lower level tracks run through under the station building and Capitol Hill via the First Street tunnel. Electrification ends at the station, and all trains continuing south through the tunnel must have their electric engines swapped out for diesel locomotives. For example, a southbound Northeast Regional train arrives on a lower level platform, on its way to Newport News, Virginia. Its EMD AEM-7, HHP-8 or ACS-64 engine is removed and set aside. A GE Genesis engine that was earlier removed from a northbound train is coupled to the front of the southbound, and it continues through the tunnel toward Virginia. The electric engine is now placed on the northbound train, which then departs north towards Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York, and eventually Boston.

The Red Line Metrorail station is underground beneath the western side of the building, and is the busiest station in the Metro system. The station exits to the street outside of the station and has direct access to the high-level Amtrak and MARC platforms.

On August 1, 2011, John Porcari, the United States Deputy Secretary of Transportation, announced that Union Station would begin serving intercity buses operated by Greyhound Lines, BoltBus, Megabus, and Washington Deluxe later that year from a new bus facility in the station's parking garage. By November 15, 2011, BoltBus, Megabus, Tripper Bus, and Washington Deluxe were operating from the new facility. On September 26, 2012, Greyhound and Peter Pan Bus Lines relocated all of their Washington, D.C., operations to the facility. Buses of the Georgetown-Union Station route of the DC Circulator system stop within the facility every ten minutes during operating hours.

Columbus Circle has been rebuilt to address the severely deteriorated roadbed, realign the passenger pickup/dropoff locations, streamline the taxi stand, and to better accommodate the popular tour bus attractions.

The Ivy City Yard, just north of Union Station, houses a large Amtrak maintenance facility. This includes the new maintenance facility for the Acela high-speed train sets. Amtrak also does contract work for MARC's electric locomotives. Metro's Brentwood maintenance facility is also in the southwest corner of the Ivy City Yard. Riders on the Metro Red Line between Union Station and Rhode Island Avenue Station get an aerial view of the south end of the Ivy City Yard.

Owner

Union Station is owned by Amtrak and United States Department of Transportation. The non-profit Union Station Redevelopment Corporation managed the station on behalf of the owners, but an 84-year lease of the property is held by New York-based Ashkenazy Acquisition Corporation and managed by Chicago-based Jones Lang LaSalle. It houses the headquarters of Amtrak and carries the IATA airport code of ZWU.

In July 2012, Amtrak announced a four-phase, $7 billion plan to revamp and renovate the station over 15 to 20 years. The proposed conversion would "double the number of trains and triple the number of passengers in gleaming, glass-encased halls". Amtrak President and CEO Joseph H. Boardman hoped the federal government would finance "50 to 80 percent" of the project.

Gallery

• 

  Interior, Waiting Room ca. 1915

• 

  Union Station's interior waiting room.

• 

  INTERIOR, TRAIN CONCOURSE, FROM WEST - Union Station

• 

  South Front Entrance, 1968

• 

  DETAIL, WEST END OF MAIN ENTRANCE PAVILION, SHOWING STATUARY AND INSCRIPTION

See also

• Union Station (Washington Metro)
• Union Station (disambiguation)
• Columbus Fountain located in front of Union Station.
• Washington Terminal Company
• American Legion Freedom Bell located in front of Union Station.

External links

• Official Site
• Amtrak – Stations – Washington Union Station
• Geographic data related to Union Station (Washington, D.C.) at OpenStreetMap
• Union Station Information - Virginia Railway Express
• Washington (WAS)--Great American Stations (Amtrak)
• Union Station, a brief history - National Railway Historical Society
• Station building from Google Maps Street View
• Union Station, a documentary produced by WETA-TV (2008)