New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1903-08-08
TO COST 100000.
Sub1cay POzCer Plant To Be Largest
and Costliest an the World.
WORK TO BE PUSHED RAPIDLY.

WORK TO BE PUSHED RAPIDLY.
By the addition of plot 1OSx2OO feet to the
site for the power plant of the rapid transit sub
way SYSTEM. the company is now building what
is generally conceded by engineers to be the
largest and costlest plant in the world for gen.
Grating electricity. The new power house. the
framework of which is more than half up. will
cover the entire space bounded by Fifty-aghth
and Fifty-ninth SITS. and Eleventh-ave. and the
rivera plot 700 feet long by 200 feet wide. The
cost of the structure. with its equipment will be
100000. and it will be about twice as large
Madison Square Garden and much larger
than the Waldorf-Astoria It needs to be seen
to be appreciated. Although there are at pres
ent five distinct sympathetic strikes among the
employees on the work, the construction is going
forward, with fair prospect that the plant will
be completed soon after January l. 1904.
The complete electric generators will produce
about 49,, 600 horsepower of electric energy, all
of which, sooner or later. will be used to drive
the that carry people in the subway and
its immediate connections. The steam plant, or
the first power, it is called by the engineers.
will be colossal in it's scope, consisting of sew
enty-two 500 horsepower boilers.
The coal supply needed for each twenty-four
hours will exceed one thousand tons. The stor-
age capacity for coal under the great steel roof
viii be twenty-five thousand tons. The coal will
be conveyed to an elevation Of more than eighty
feet above the street by belt conveyers, and then
it will be fed down to the boilers as fast
needed by automatic stokers. After the coal has
been consumed the ashes will be off the
CRATES to cars, which viii run short distance
to the riverside. and dump their contents into
scows. The water for the plant is taken from
about hundred feet out in the river and is
conveyed to the Eleventh-ave end of the plant
and forced through the boilers by pumps. The
five chimneys are unusual in their construction,
in that their bases will rest on steel platforms
about forty feet above the floor of the power
house. Building the stacks from the ground up
would have occupied a great deal of valuable
space in the middle of the building. The CHM
neys will reach a height Of go feet. They will
be made of brick.
The plant is equipped with two electric cranes
one of sixty and the other of twenty-five tons
carrying capacity. The power for the subway
system will be conveyed to eight distributing
stations, where the currents will be transformed
for driving the cars. The outside walls of the
building are cut granite up to a given point and
above that of terra Gotta and pressed brick
The interior is lined with chocolate and cream
colored brick, and above the second story with
an attractive shade of buff brick. The windows
are all Of steel frame. The roof is to be Of
terra Gotta and glass, with copper conductors
There are to be over twelve thousand tons of
steel In the building. Although badly handi
capped by the strikes, Mr.. Mcdonald says that
as fast as the men can be induced to go back to
work or new ones hired to take the places Of
those who do not care to work any longer, the
work will be pushed night and day.