A MONUMENTAL PASSENGER STATION

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE NEW YORK STATION AND TUNNELS OF THE PENNSYLVANIA RAILROAD, OPENED FOR TRAFFIC IN SEPTEMBER,

1910.

Of first importance in railway accomplishment during the year 1910 was the opening for traffic of the monumental station of the Pennsylvania system in the very heart of Manhattan Island. Covering eight acres of what was formerly residence and business property with a building of noble architectural beauty, it crowns with success an undertaking abounding in engineering and financial difficulties. Situated in the blocks bounded by Thirty-first and Thirty-third streets on the South and North, and by Seventh and Eighth avenues on the East and West, its eight acres of masonry, structural iron and Italian marble actually form a bridge dome over the entrances to two sets of tunnels. The premier of these bores under the North (Hudson) river. What may be considered the secondary set pierces the backbone of Manhattan, passes under the East river and comes to the surface on Long Island.

But the station, whose classic proportions appeal to the eye and whose conveniences mark the latest attempt to meet the demands of modern passenger travel, occupies less than one-third of the property necessary to carry out the far-sighted designs of its projectors and construction. Between Eighth and Tenth avenues to the West, four blocks have been obtained and excavated to afford space for storage of cars and for the two tunnel tracks that emerge from the Tenth avenue portal to spread out into the twenty-one tracks that enter beneath the station. To the East the number of tracks decreases from twenty-one to four for the main line. These last pass under the city and East river to the Sunnyside yard on Long Island, the terminus of the tunnel extension and the point of connection with the Long Island Railroad.

All told the station and yards have an area of twenty-eight acres, in which there are sixteen miles of track. The storage tracks will hold 386 cars. The length of the twenty-one standing tracks in the station is 21,500 feet. Between these tracks are eleven passenger platforms, with twenty-five baggage and express elevators. The highest point of these tracks is nine feet below the sea level.

The western tunnel extension of this great terminal begins at Harrison, New Jersey, a short distance East of Newark and 8.6

miles from the station in Manhattan. Here through passenger trains from Southern and Western points change from steam to electric power and pass over a double track elevated line on embankments and bridges across the Hackensack Meadows to the Bergen Hill portals to the tunnel under the Hudson. They emerge at Tenth avenue, New York, after attaining a maximum depth of 97 feet below mean high water.

The tunnels or tubes themselves consist of a series of iron rings and the installation of each ring meant an advance of two and a half feet. Eleven segments and a key piece at the top complete the circumference. An entire ring weighed about fifteen tons. The record progress in one day of eight hours was five of these rings, or twelve and one-half feet. Hydraulic rams, placed against the flanges every few inches around the tube, were used to push forward the huge shields with which the tunnels were bored. This type of shield weighed 194 tons. It had nine doors in it, and through these came rock, or sand, or silt, or whatever material the tube penetrated. The engineering exactness with which this work was performed was demonstrated when on September 17, 1906, the shields under the Hudson met without the variation of a fraction of an inch.

When the tubes were through, the work of lining them with 22 inches of concrete was begun. On each side of the tunnel there is a so-called bench three feet wide which serves as a walk, under which are carried conduits for telegraph, telephone, signal and power wires.

As for the station proper, its vast proportions and imposing architectural features entitle it to be classed with the truly great buildings of the world. The Vatican, the Tuileries and the Winter Palace at St. Petersburg are larger, but no man who saw the laying of their foundations lived to see their completion. The Pennsylvania station was erected in less than six years and the great undertaking of which it is the culmination was completed in less than nine years from the grant of the franchise by the city of New York.

Built after the Roman Doric style of architecture, the station building has a frontage of 784 feet on the streets and 430 feet on the avenues. The average height above the street is 69 feet, with a maximum of 153 to the top of the dome over the main waiting

room.