The fairwell to Chicago's Grand Central

[daveklepper]

I did make an overnight Chicago - Toronto trip around that time.  Both ways by train.   My memory is that I used a roomette both ways.  But a photo of a section sleeper on the CN-GTW International waould havev been a natural.  Can any reader check to see if the vInternational carried such a car in 1969?

[daveklepper]

And here is boarding the roomette-bedroom sleeper I did use on that last Capitol Limited from Chicago's Grand Central Station:

 

[rcdrye]

The International carried 6 Sec 6 Rmt 4 DBR sleepers.  The cars were built in 1954 as part of the large upgrade of CN services.  The open sections in the photo look like other CN open sections of the era. 

[daveklepper]

Then that is it!   Thanks!

 

going back to the Capitol Limited sleeper I rode, I did some photo editing, taking lessons from Richard Allman's fine, and I think readers will prefer this version:

But bI see it can be improved further, when I have time. 

[daveklepper]

Lounge and diner, very minor editing on these

[richhotrain]

NorthWest

It's a shame that GCS did not survive. 

And the sad joke of it all is that after the completion of demolition in November, 1971, the property remained completely vacant until 1984 when a 17-story apartment building was erected near the south end of the site, nowhere near the intersection of Harrison and Wells where the station itself once proudly stood. The land at the corner of Harrison and Wells, the lot on which the station itself stood, remained vacant until early 2020. 

You could fairly blame the politicians for the failure to preserve the station. At least that dignity was granted to nearby Dearborn Station when it closed. It is hard to find many older buildings in downtown Chicago because its politicians seem obsessed with tearing everything down, and now, post-pandemic, downtown Chicago is becoming a ghost town with tons of vacant office space and very little residential housing.

As a lifelong Chicagoan, having been raised on the southwest side and employed in the south end of the “Loop” for most of my working 45 years, today’s downtown area is nearly unrecognizable to anyone who last visited or worked in the area back in 1965 when I first began working downtown.

Rich

[CSSHEGEWISCH]

I do remember that there were a number of proposals for the property before anything actually occurred.  Dearborn Station was also factored into the plans for the Dearborn Park development.  Such a situation is more the exception than the rule since most developers would prefer to have complete control over what gets built without having to work around anything.

[railfanjohn]

 

 

 

daveklepper

 

 ....  "I did some photo editing, taking lessons from Richard Allman's fine, and I think readers will prefer this version:"

But bI see it can be improved further, when I have time. 

 

 

Except you 'decapitated' the Porter in the edited photo.

[daveklepper]

Huh?   I see his head clearly in the edited photo.  He is shorter than any of the photo's passengers, and has his cap snugly over his head and ears.  All much clearer when edited the Richard Allman way.