These icons of railroad history largely passed from the landscape after 1970. Kansas City's Union Station had one.
Union Station was renovated over several years and in a fit of miscalculation a food court was built into the area formerly occupied by the Harvey House restaurant.
Just a little over a year ago an actual restaurant called the Harvey House open in this space, decorated like the old Harvey House restaurant.
If you happen to pass through Kansas City, and stop at the Union Station it is open from breakfast and lunch until around 5:00 pm. Someday it might open in the evenings.
Here's what you may want to know about the Harvey House:
It is a diner, with diner fare, a blue plate special and no high cuisine.
The food is very inexpensive and good.
The service is the biggest dissappointment-sometimes they have bad days and the wait staff just doesn't seem to be on, so food can come slow, and there is sometimes little attention paid to the customer. You may sit for 10 minutes before having anyone come to your table.
This last item is the worst thing about the restaurant. In my opinion it is the only bad thing about it. I should also say that most of the time I get good service, good food and always the good price (I think the highest priced thing on the menu is $8.95 most things around around $6.)
The atmosphere is great, Union Station is beautiful and the echoes of great railroad days can still be felt there. Right now the huge garden railway is being installed for the duration of the holiday season in the main hall (going up early because of work going on in its basement location).
Unfortunately not, and not because I prefer the female attention. What I mentioned about the hit and miss service (which is completely a management problem) would never have happened at a real Harvey House.
The parent company for this diner carries the name "Treat America;" it is a horrible name for a company, but has quite a number of food services in KC (cafeterias in big concerns like the IRS services center etc.
As I mentioned the only thing that the new Harvey House suffers under is their self-inflicted service issues. The food and price area great, the atmosphere is wonderful, and the restaurant does a lot of business all the time.