Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1902-06-20
THE UNION DEPOT.
Reasons Why the c Street Site is
Preferable.

To the Editor of The Evening Star:
The action of the House committee to
place the union depot against the scarp of
Capitol Hill instead of in the flats of Swami
poodle, will now recommend itself to the
sober second thought of nearly all our citi
Zens.
However well intended, and perhaps guild
ed by the landscape commission to which
the populous city is experimental garden,
the low, hollow site proposed by the Senate
committee. at Massachusetts and Delaware
avenues, would have deformed all the
grades, partitioned the city for all time to
come. made a purleu of the Capitol Hill,
with its large population, and involved
expense in grading up to the viaduct which
would have staggered our modest resources.
We must have flied up area at a
frightful cost which is we'll understood by
all contractors who have to carry cubical
yards of earth. l have had an experience
of that kind in building the army
respondents memorial at Gapland, on
mountain summit, where l desired to grade
up q slope which / thought might be done
for $50. so small was the superficial area to
be filled. 1t was a small triangle of appar
emily five feet slope, and some sixty or sew
enty feet on the sides, but it cost me $500,
tenth of the whole cost of the monument
and site.
Raise this grade to thirty feet in an area
of many acres the size of small farm, and
the cost to every lot holder would have
been incredible.
BY taking advantage of the natural Gle
walton of Capitol Hill the depot will become
the mouth of the tunnel and the topo-
graphical expense will be underground in
stead of above the surface.
The tunnel is the minimum of earth work
a cylinder. The grades to the north will
be left in their natural state with an open
steel suporStruc ure, under which the grades
of the streets can remain as they are, and
they have cost great money and conform
hnc fxr nft -l11a ntt,
instead of raising mighty hump of earth
and grading the surrounding town TO it,
whereas common sense suggests that the
depot be graded to the town.
These landscape gardeners overlook the
architectural effect of a splendid mass of
structure, like the castle of Blois or the
convent of Assist, raised against an emf
nence like the Capitol Hill, facing the Capt.
tol building and conforming that plaza TO
the majesty of the Capitol and the Library.
1t will at once end the problem, on that
side of a parcel of cheap houses scattered
disconsola tely, because their owners do not
know when the ultimate plans of the gov
eminent mean to dispose of them. The
house of our parliament will become
neighbor to the palace Of transporta ton.
The utility of the railroads. a noble and
military power in the land, will be raised
to an appropriate dignity. next to the gov
eminent and near enough to be within it's
call, instead of banished to a hole where
the railroad officials will take no pleasure
of the elevation, and, in effect, will bury
themselves and their architecture.
A scaffold, causeway, will extend an
artificial shoulder of the natural eminence
into the hot. malarious plain, throwing out
OF proportion the beautiful plateau which
was the original attraction to set the Capt.
toll at this high, captoline spot.
The rectification of the notional plan to
put the depot nowhere instead of some
where Is an encouraging view of our legis-
lators in these hasty days
Nor did Mr.. Cassatt and his staff ever
think of the Massachusetts avenue site
till 1t was presented to them and their
amenability deferred to the amateur COM
mission.
We want the depot now while credit is
strong and stocks and bonds sell. instead of
taking the chances of the next panic and
achieving no depot till we are dead.
Are there any two buildings in Washing
ton which will attract more visitors than
the Capitol and the Library - business
scholarly visitors, who want to be deposited
and to start away without loss of time or
expense?
The West End does not want the rail-
roads. AT the place indicated they will
perform their short connection under the
earth. All the executive action of this gov
eminent centers in the congressional com
mttees. New York is the corresponding
center of Washington. Time wasted in
CABS to depot In no proximity will be 4
subject of eXtortion and delay.
GEORGE ALFRED TOWNSEND.