Construction of New Building and Improved Passenger
Facilities for a City of 240,000 Population
The new station of the New York Central & Hudson River, at Rochester, N. Y., which was opened January 19, as
mentioned in the news columns of the Railway Age Gazette,
adjoins and replaces the old station which had been in service
about 31 1/3 years. This station is used by all through trains on
the New York Central main line as well as branch line trains
on the Auburn road, the Rochester & Charlotte branch, the
Rochester & Niagara Falls branoh and the Ontario & St.
Lawrence division. and the importance of this business warrants
the large investment that has been made. The station is of the
through type with 11 station tracks served by 6 platforms in
,addition to 2 through passenger and 2 freight tracks not adjacent
to platforms. Each station track has a capacity of 14 cars. Stub
tracks are provided at the ends of each platform for storage.
The station platforms are reached from subways under the
tracks. In addition to the station building, train platforms
and track changes, the work has involved the construction of
two new street bridges and the reconstruction of two old ones, the building of a power house, ice house, gas and oil house and
service building.
An Exterior View of the New York Central Station at Rochester
The new building is located on a triangular piece of ground between Central avenue, Joseph avenue and the tracks. In order to utilize this property to the best advantage, the main station building, a rectangular structure about 260 ft. by 134 ft. was placed parallel to the street and the express building parallel to the tracks with its east end reaching to Joseph avenue. The entire space between these buildings and the tracks is enclosed and used in the main for the baggage room and passenger concourse.
Track Layout and General Arrangement of
New Station Building at Rochester, N. Y.
Click on image for a larger view
The main entrance of the station is in the middle of the Central avenue side which is passed by a street car line and
can be approached by carriages over a wide driveway. The
main exit is at the west end of the concourse connecting to Clinton street, along which a cab stand is providded. Baggage, mail and express will be received. and delivered in a large
court at the east end between Joseph avenue and the station
building.
The building is a steel frame structure carried on concrete
piers with spread footings on hard pan that showed a supporting
power of 15 tons per sq. ft. under test. The walls are of
Medina sandstone up to the second floor level and of a reddish
purple brick for the remaining height with Long Meadow
sandstone trim. The roof over the waiting room is supported
by four pairs of three-hinged steel arch trusses with a span of
90 ft. 8 in. The four-story portions of the structure at each
end containing the 'office floors are severely plain in external
treatment. but the waiting room portion which occupies the center
of the building relieves this effect by the emphasis of the arch
outline in the large windows and the roof. The entire length
of this central portion of the building is covered by a heavy
marquise above which is set a large clock.
An Interior Detail of the Main Entrance
The main waiting room is an unusually large and artistically finished room for a station of this size. It is about 90 ft. by
155 ft. and 54 ft. high, which is larger than the waiting room
of the union station in St. Louis and about 70 per cent. as
large as that in the new North Western station at Chicago. A
broad stairway leads down from the main entrance to the waiting
room floor which is 6 ft. below the level of the street in
front of the building and about 9 1/2; ft. below the base of rail
on the station tracks. The room seats 440 people, the benches
being double and enclosing the radiating surface of the heating
system. They are surmounted by double bracketed electric
reading lamps. The floor is terrazzo, the wainscoting Grueby
tile, the wal1s tapestry brick and the arched ceiling Gustavino
tile. By a skillful use of materials harmonizing in colors the
room is given a warm. rich appearance without any suggestion
of the ornate. The wainscoting is a deep brown with a border
of green. hlue and yellow. The walls are buff and the ceiling yellow, with traces of pink. Abundant light is secured through
three large arched window$ on each side and' one at each end.
In addition to the reading lights, three large bronze electroliers
furnish artificial light.
Along the street side of the waiting room on either side of
the main entrance are located the information and parcel rooms
and the men's pay toilets. Directly across the room from the
main entrance is the vestibuled entrance to the concourse. To
the east of this entrance is the baggage checking counter which
adjoins the baggage room on the rear. On the other side of
the concourse entrance are the news stand, telegraph booth and
a passageway from the concourse for the use of passengers
coming from trains who want to enter the waiting rooms. . At
the west end of the waiting room are located the lunch room
and dining room with the smoking room and men's free toilet
in the corner next to the street. A row of telephone booths
is placed along the waH between the entrances to the lunch
room and dining room. At the opposite end of the waiting room
is the ticket office and in the front corner on that end are the
women's rooms and toilets. Quarters for a barber shop, the
station master, the station police and a branch station of the
post office are provided on a mezzanine floor around the waiting
room.
A General View of the Waiting Room,
Which is the Principal Feature of the New Building
Trains will be announted in the waiting room and passengers
held at the entrance to the concourse until the arrival of their
trains. Passing through this entrance, they reach the concourse,
a triangular room with a flat ceiling of beam and slab construction
with skylights in the panels. The walls are faced with
cream colored pressed brick, the ceiling. is plastered and the
cement floor is laid on a slight ramp to connect with the passenger
subway under the tracks.
This subway is about 30 ft. wide and 8 ft. high with a row of columns down the center. It is of reinforced concrete construction lead up in both directions to the five island platforms. These platforms have a maximum length of 1,200 ft. and a maximum width of 20 ft. They are each covered for a portion of their length by steel frame canopies. A special hospital room is provided in the express building which can be reached from the first platform.
This room is fitted with hot and cold water and all necessary first aid supplies.
The baggage, mail and express matter is trucked between the respective quarters in the east end of the station and the express building and the three platforms serving westbound trains through a baggage subway under the tracks with elevators to each of these platforms. The three eastbound platforms are reached by trucking across the tracks at grade from the second floor of the express building. The baggage subway is 20 ft. wide and 9 ft. high, of concrete construction throughout.
There are three office floors in each end of the main building
providing accommodations for all of the company's local offices.
These floors can be reached either directly from the street or
from either end of the waiting room. The offices are located
along the outer face of the building with a corridor through the
middle and file rooms adjacent to the light court which separates
the upper floors from the ends of the main waiting room.
All offices are finished in oak with plaster walls and ceilings.
The power house is located across the track, directly north of
the station. It is a brick building about 40 ft. by 110 ft. in
size with steel trusses supporting a concrete slab roof. Coal is dumped from an elevated track into storage bins in front of
the three 200 h. p. boilers. The ashes are dumped into hoppers
under the front of the boilers and then into skips which elevate
them to bins over the coal tracks. Provision has been made
in the design of the bunkers for the installation of another
battery of boilers. The engine room equipment includes two
steam turbines to circulate the hot water for the heating system,
two pumps for supplying the hydraulic elevators, one pump
for domestic water and two for boiler feed water, a sixsweeper
steam driven vacuum cleaning plant, a fire pump and
a 15-ton Whiting crane.
All pipes are carried from the power house to the station building in a pipe tunnel 7 ft. 6 in. by 8 ft., located under the baggage tunnel, with branches extending under the main building and under the express building. Drinking water which is taken from the city mains is cooled in an icing tank in this tunnel and circulated to fountains in the atation. Electric power for lighting and operating the electric elevators and other motor driven apparatus is bought from the local public service company and is distributed from a terminal board in the tunnel. A separate emergency electricity supply is brought in at the west end of the building and a separate conduit carries the telephone and telegraph wires. The clock system of the entire terminal is controlled from a master' clock in the despatcher's office. Ventilating fans with a suction system for all toilets are located in the pipe galleries under the station. All sewage is collected to a 4-ft. stone arch sewer carried under the tracks to a connection with the city system.
The design and construction of this new station was handled
under the direction of the engineering department of the New
York Central, of which G. W. Kittredge is chief engineer;
C. J. Parker, principal assistant engineer; J. W. Pfau, engineer
of construction; D. R. Collin, architect; F. E. Paradis. district
engineer, and ]. B. Reinhardt, resident engineer. The company's
architect was assisted by Claude F. Bragdon, Rochester. The
general contract was let to Gorsline & Swan Construction Co.,
Rochester, and work was begun on August 30, 1910.
RAILWAY AGE GAZEITE; February 13, 1914