By Stephen Jacob Smith 2/27 5:02pm

Planes Trains & Automobiles

"It was controlled by a bunch of rich developers," David Gunn once said of Moynihan Station.

Former Amtrak President David Gunn Still Hates Moynihan Station

David Gunn was never a fan of Moynihan Station. When he was president of Amtrak during the early George W. Bush years, he pulled the railroad out of the project, which seeks to recreate the glory of the old Pennsylvania Station in the James Farley Post Office across Eighth Avenue. At the time, costs were the stated reason: Amtrak was expected to contribute to its new home, and Mr. Gunn said that the railroad had more pressing needs.

Current Amtrak President Joseph Boardman picked the project back up in 2009, and though it’s largely unfunded, Amtrak still intends to go through with the move. This, Mr. Gunn told The Observer this afternoon from his home in Nova Scotia, would be a mistake. Read More

By Stephen Jacob Smith 2/19 4:50pm

Planes Trains & Automobiles

With the LIRR diverting some trains to Grand Central, Penn Station could see Metro-North trains if the MTA goes through with West Side Access.

West Side vs. East Side (Access): Upper West Side May Get Metro-North Stop

East Side Access, which will give Long Island Rail Road commuters the choice of arriving at Grand Central Terminal in addition to the current terminus at Pennsylvania Station, may get all the buzz and billions in capital funding, but it’s the Bronx and the West Side that may be getting new regional rail stations.

West Side Access, as the plan is being called, would involve building a number of new stations within New York City, on the West Side and the Bronx, which would see direct service to Penn Station operated by Metro-North Railroad. The plan has been under consideration for decades, but will finally be added to the MTA’s next five-year capital construction program due out in 2014, according to Newsday. Compared to the $8.24 billion East Side Access project, West Side Access would be downright cheap: in the “hundreds of millions of dollars,” according to MTA spokesman Aaron Donovan. Read More

By Matt Chaban 7/10/12 11:32am

Planes Trains & Automobiles

17 Photos

Moynihan Station Goes Retro

Inside the Retro-Futuristic Moynihan Station: Newest Plans Are a Throwback to the Old Post Office

Back in May, Amtrak invited bigs from both sides of the Hudson, Albany and D.C. to come celebrate the start of phase one construction on Moynihan Station—even Rosario Dawson, train aficionado, was there. Yet more striking than the silver screen star were the new renderings for Moynihan Station that Amtrak showed off.

Not just the banal concourses of Phase 1 that have bandied about before—nothing new there—but honest to god interiors of the grand train hall meant to restore Penn Station to its former glory inside the old Farley Post office. In a bid for both historical preservation and cost savings, the roof of the post office will no longer be ripped off and replaced with a new glass ceiling, but instead the existing one, with its massive steel trusses will be preserved. Read More

By Matt Chaban 5/15/12 7:10pm

Planes Trains & Automobiles

She's the spokesman and a rider. (Amtrak)

Rosario Dawson Rails on Moynihan Station: She’s Amtrak’s Biggest Fan Since Joe Biden

“My oldest memory of riding the train? I don’t know, that’s hard,” Rosario Dawson told The Observer last Tuesday night. “I was born in Coney Island, but grew up on the Lower East Side, so we spent a lot of time on the F-Train, going to the beach. My dad used to wear his little shorts, and the knee-high socks. He was the most handsome guy on the entire boardwalk.”

And thus the country’s most beautiful railroad buff was born.

Ms. Dawson was standing inside a post office in Midtown, there for a four-course dinner at which she was the guest of honor. She wore a form-fitting black pant suit, ruffled black shirt and black pumps that had to be nine-inches long and sharper than a railroad tie.

This was no ordinary post office, to be fair, but the Corinthian temple on Eighth Avenue known as the James Farley building, once Manhattan’s central post office, and certainly its grandest. From a staff of thousands, there is now a skeleton crew of about a hundred, which has freed up acres of space in the building for Moynihan Station. A dream since the early 1990s of the former New York senator for whom it is named, it will allow for the expansion of Penn Station across the avenue and out of the hell it has resided in for the past six decades, since Robert Moses destroyed the original Penn in 1963. Read More