Evening star., 1908-01-26
LIKE PAVED PRAIRIE
Union Station AppaIs Traveller
From Peoria.
ENTRANCE BIG AS A HOTEL
Compared to an Escaped Worlds
Fair Building.
LONG JOURNEY TO THE TRAIN
Pilgrim Advocates Creating Ma
tional Park in Far End of Build
ing, With Tourists.
LONG JOURNEY TO THE TRAIN


then committed his woes to paper and
sent them to the Herald Transcript of his
; city. His description of the station Is SO
cram-jam full of local color that occa-
sionally the facts are obscured. but a
) light heart carries him joyfully over the
bumps.
The plant he sent back to Peoria is as
) follows:
The biggest thing in Washington Just
now Is the Washington Union station. 1t
) Is bigger than the Capitol. the President
or the Japanese question. Everybody is
talking about it, wondering at it and
getting lost in It. 1t is the biggest rail-
way station in the world, just like the
! Boston station, the ST. Louis station and
a lot of other stations.
Large as East Peoria"
The Washington station, several acres
of which have been completed and thrown
open for use, is an immense white granite
structure, about large as East Peoria.
In shape it is long. low building, about
75O feet long by 100 feet high, surmounted
by a green glass dome looking like bar
rel floating half way out of the building.
This is merely worldly technical de-
scription of the building. which is further
ornamented and aggravated with col
umns plasters, pylons. arcades. clofsters,
pediments balustrades and scads of other
architectural protuberances. 1t looks like
an escaped worlds fair building, white
and dazzling, and it will remain white
and dazzling for ages to come, for
Washington is the one city in the country
| which hasn't smoke question. There
isn't any smoke in Washington. for there
| are no factories, and most of the board
ing house keepers are too stingy to burn
-; n1yn in all
| Washington is that left by Uncle Joe
Cannon as he travels about the Capitol
| building, fighting off the presidential bee.
Really. this big Washington depot is
too enormous. Some poor Old LADY Is
going to starve to death some day on
her way from the ladies' waiting room
to the lunch counter, and tnen there
/ will be a scandal In the first place,
the depot is set in the middle of a plaza,
two blocks deep. At present this is
| waste of clay which will eventually be
IA lawn. There are no street cars across
the plaza because Congress got balky
one day and refused to arrange the de-
tails
Climates of Waiting Room.
At the end of the plaza comes the
beginning of the front door of the
depot This is a huge recess about as
big as the Niagara Hotel. Struggling
across this, the traveller enters the
building and finds himself in the main
waiting room.
He might as we'll find himself in Kan
sas. This waiting room is about toO
feet long and 100 feet broad. 1t is 80
feet high, and it's enormous dome is
studded with gold spangles, which the
bewildered visitor mistakes for stars at
first glance. This room is so large that
the climate at the south end IS ma
terially different from the climate at the
/ north end and the attendants speak
| with different accent. 1t is a magnih-
cent room, but perfectly useless, being
/ impossible to wait in. You might as
we'll wait at home, as 1t is only IL little
farther away. AS for changing cars
while passing through Washington. un-
/ less you have to wait half day or
| more you can only use the section OF
the waiting room nearest the door. My
idea is that the farther part CT the
depot will always be too far away for
| any one to use, and should be made into
| a national park. .
| cent affair when completed and will be
well worth touring. 1t will be finished
| in white with gold frescoes, and Will be
| elaborated with gardens, orchards,
| shade trees and monuments OF various
descriptions Whether it Will contain
sight seeing automobiles is for Con-
greSS to decide.
Cherokee Strip Concourse.
Emerging from the waiting room. the
stunned and dazzled traveller staggers
out into the grand concourse. This is
sort of Cherokee strip, or no mans land,
shaped like the panhandle of Oklahoma
1t is 100 feet wide and 7oo feet broad. and
| is all under one vast roof, which, now
ever, isn't so lofty as the waiting room
| dome At the fer side of the concourse
are the train gates, thirty-six in number,
| find your train without a guide YOU are
| extremely likely to land lp feet away
| from the right gatc-even assuming thal
| you are able to find which IS the flgnl
| gate.
| The station is magnificent and most
| ornamental. 1t is longer than the Capt.
| tol and does not contain so many hideous
| PAINTINGS nor disreDuted characters. But
| I prophesy that until its street car and
| transportation facilities are improved it
| will never become an object of affection
| to the traveller.
To illustrate. suppose you leave your
hotel in a hurry at $3.50 to catch the 1910
| train to Havre de Grace or Boiled Lob
| ster or some other Maryland town. The
street cars carry you 70 the edge of the
alleged plaza and dump you. two blocks
/ from the frontier of the station. Suppose
1t is hot day and you have to set down
your suit case four times to MOP your
| brow while you travel those two blocks.
All of this takes time. 1t is 1905 when
| you enter the beg inning of the front door.
Prairie Paved With Marble.
You struggle through the front doo- and
find youself on a vast prairie paved with
marble Above you is something that
looks like rain cloud. Just as you are
about to hoist your umbrella you find that
1t is piece of sail cloth stretched over
half an acre of the dome which is being
repaired Off on the horizon you see the
door to the grand concourse. There are
no automobiles in sight thither you
stagger.
The grand concourse is reached at last
block away is the ticket office. You
rush down there, buy your ticket and ask
where your train is. Don't know"
says the hi-eling. Yesterday it was a
} block south. but they may have changed
it, Better ask the information bureau.
This is a block north You reach it
and find that your train is on track >.
two blocks south. You dash for the gate
and reach it just as the clock indicates
1910.
Saved you gasp. But YOU aren't
This my train?' you ask another
You'll have to hurry. is the answer.
, Then you discover that the train shed is
a quarter of mile long and that the
fool railroad company has backed a
dozen coaches in on it and is starting its
train at the far end. The result is. you
watch your train leave while you are
running for it. You go to the station ten
minutes early. But that wasn't early
enough.
have two railway stations bigger than
| yI,iS. Il.