St. Louis Union Station

St. Louis Union Station

Infobox_nrhp | name =St. Louis Union Station
nrhp_type =nhl


|thumb
caption = Outside the station is Carl Milles' fountain sculpture "Meeting Waters"
location= St. Louis, Missouri
USA
lat_degrees = | lat_minutes = | lat_seconds = | lat_direction = N
long_degrees = | long_minutes = | long_seconds = | long_direction = W
area =
built =1892-94
architect= Theodore Link
architecture= Victorian
Romanesque
designated= December 30, 1970cite web|url=http://tps.cr.nps.gov/nhl/detail.cfm?ResourceId=1044&ResourceType=Building|title=Union Station |accessdate=2008-06-28|work=National Historic Landmark summary listing|publisher=National Park Service]
added = December 30, 1970
governing_body =
refnum=70000888

St. Louis Union Station, a National Historic Landmark, is a former passenger train terminal in St. Louis, Missouri. Once the world's largest and busiest train station, it was converted in the early 1980s into a luxury hotel, shopping center, and entertainment complex. Today, it is one of the city's major tourist attractions.

The station opened on September 1, 1894, and was owned by the Terminal Railroad Association of St. Louis. Designed by Theodore Link, it included three main areas: the Headhouse, the Midway and the 11.5-acre Train Shed. The headhouse originally housed a hotel, a restaurant, passenger waiting rooms and railroad ticketing offices. It featured a gold-leafed Grand Hall, Romanesque arches, a 65-foot barrel-vaulted ceiling and stained-glass windows. The clock tower is 280 feet high.

Union Station's headhouse and midway are constructed of Indiana limestone and initially included 32 tracks under its vast trainshed terminating in the stub-end terminal.

At its height, the station combined the St. Louis passenger services of 22 railroads. At its opening, it was the world's largest and busiest railroad station and its trainshed was the largest roof span in the world. In 1903, the station was expanded to accommodate visitors to the 1904 St. Louis World's Fair.

In the 1940s, it handled 100,000 passengers a day. The famous photograph of Harry S. Truman holding aloft the erroneous "Chicago Tribune" headline, "Dewey Defeats Truman," was shot at the station as Truman headed back to Washington, DC from Independence, Missouri after the 1948 Presidential election.

As railroad passenger services declined in the 1950s and 1960s, the massive station became obsolete and too expensive to maintain for its original purpose. With the takeover of national rail passenger service by Amtrak in 1971, passenger train service to St. Louis was reduced to only three trains a day. In 1978, the last train left St. Louis Union Station. Amtrak trains began using a small building two blocks east of Union Station, dubbed "Amshak" by rail enthusiasts. The "temporary" structure is to be replaced by a new intermodal facility, now under construction.

In August 1985, after a $150 million renovation, Union Station was reopened with a 539-room hotel, shopping mall, restaurants and food court. The hotel is housed in the headhouse and part of the train shed, which also houses a lake and shopping, entertainment and dining establishments. Omni, the original hotel operator, has since been replaced by the Hyatt Regency Hotel chain.

MetroLink, the St. Louis light rail mass transit system, serves Union Station from its station next to the trainshed.

Filming

In 1981, the disused Grand Hall was used in John Carpenter's movie "Escape from New York", doubling for Madison Square Gardens during the film's gladiatorial fight. [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0082340/trivia]

Photo gallery

ee also

*List of railway stations

References

*Cite book | author=Montesi, Albert and Richard Deposki| title=St. Louis Union Station | year= 2002| publisher= Arcadia Publishing| id = ISBN 0738519839
*cite web|url=http://dnr.mo.gov/shpo/nps-nr/70000888.pdf|title=National Register of Historic Places: Inventory - Nomination Form|publisher=Missouri Department of Natural Resources|accessdate=2008-05-30|format=PDF

External links

* [http://www.stlouisunionstation.com/ Official Website]
* [http://www.explorestlouis.com/factSheets/fact_unionStat.asp?PageType=2 Explore St. Louis profile]


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