On January 1, the gigantic new Moynihan Train Hall officially opened to the public.
Governor Cuomo announced the grand opening earlier in the week, and New Yorkers have been making their way to see the stunning completed $1.6 billion project ever since.
The brand new train hall is 255,000 square feet, in the former over-100-year-old James A. Farley Building, once the main United States Postal Service building. The new hall has been named after U.S. Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, and will increase Penn Station’s current concourse by a whopping 50 percent. There is also a newly completed East End Gateway at 33rd St. and 7th Ave. that opened on New Year’s Eve.
“The completion of this gorgeous new train hall would be a special accomplishment at any time, but it’s an extraordinary accomplishment today because we’re at a place where no one ever envisioned being. This has been a traumatic year, both individually and collectively, and the question facing us has been, how do we respond?” Governor Cuomo said in a press statement.
Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan was a man of true vision. He saw the potential in an underutilized post office and knew that if done correctly, this facility could not only give New York the transit hub it has long deserved, but serve as a monument to the public itself. We built this as a statement of who we are, and who we aspire to be. Is it grand? Yes. Is it bold? Yes, because that is the spirit of New York and that is the statement we want to make to our visitors, to our children and to future generations.
The grand new design of the hall features a “one-acre sky-lit atrium, a signature clock, cutting-edge technology, clear wayfinding, full accessibility, and museum-caliber public art.”
Penn Station is used by more than 700,000 passengers per day, making it the the busiest passenger transportation facility in the Western Hemisphere. The new train hall used inspiration from the original Penn Station, which was demolished in 1963 to make way for Madison Square Garden. Perhaps the most striking feature is a massive, 92-foot-high skylight that holds an acre of glass. It’s supported by the building’s original steel trusses with an intricate lattice framework.
Besides providing ample space for commuters and travelers, it also behaves as a kind of public museum, with permanent art installations by world-renowned artists like Douglas, Kehinde Wiley, and artistic duo Elmgreen & Dragset.
Another beautiful feature is a six-foot by 12-foot clock designed by Pennoyer Architects that “evokes nostalgia for the golden age of rail travel.” Another impressive design fact? More than 80,000 square feet of marble was used for the floors and walls of the main train hall, sourced from the same Tennessee quarries that provided the marble for Grand Central Terminal over 100 years ago!
Looks like quite the sight to behold!
featured image source: Instagram / @nyclovesnyc