(rshsdepot) Hoboken Terminal, NJ

[I95BERNIEW_@_aol.com]

From today's Star-Ledger.
 
 
Bernie Wagenblast
Transportation Communications Newsletter
_http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/transport-communications/_ 
(http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/transport-communications/)  
 
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TOWER'S TIME COMES AGAIN
A former landmark is about to return to the Hoboken  waterfront 
Tuesday, June 06, 2006  
BY RUDY LARINI
Star-Ledger Staff 
Once one of the most prominent features of New Jersey's Hudson River  
waterfront, the elegant clock tower atop the historic Hoboken railroad and ferry  
terminal will again rise above the city skyline.  
NJ Transit has dismantled a steel-framed radio tower that replaced the ornate 
 clock tower that once graced the roof of Hoboken Terminal.  
The agency, which owns the nearly century-old terminal, will build a replica  
of the old four-faced clock tower as part of a $115 million rehabilitation  
project that seeks to restore the terminal to its original design, with ferry  
service returning to five of the six original slips and redevelopment of the  
adjacent rail yard.  
"I was so happy to hear about the clock tower. This has been a project I've  
been pursuing for nine years now," said Mayor David Roberts, who began 
pressing  NJ Transit to include the clock tower as part of any terminal renovation 
project  when he was a city councilman before becoming mayor five years ago.  
City historian Lenny Luizzi said local officials had been losing faith that  
the clock tower would ever be rebuilt. "It seems like now it's going to 
happen,"  he said. "I just feel very good about it."  
The tower, designed by artist Kenneth Murchinson, was part of the original  
terminal built by the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western Railroad in 1907. It  was 
taken down in the late 1940s after it was damaged by lightning, Luizzi said.  
Part of the terminal's Beaux-Arts design, the tower stood 203 feet tall and  
featured four-foot backlit letters spelling the word "LACKAWANNA" on all four  
sides, as well as four pediment clock faces and a large, hipped roof topped 
by a  flagpole.  
"The clock tower was one of the tallest, most important pieces of  
architecture on the Jersey side of the river," Roberts said. "It signified to  everyone 
in a very proud way where the Hoboken Terminal was and where the city  of 
Hoboken was."  
"I'm, of course, excited," said Theresa Castellano, chairwoman of the Hoboken 
 Historical Preservation Commission. "NJ Transit is trying to restore the  
building to what it once was, and we certainly applaud any restoration that  
would go on. It's like having respect for your grandmother."  
Hoboken Terminal, which serves 40,000 commuters a day and was added to the  
National Register of Historic Places in 1973, has a distinguished past and has  
been rejuvenated as a hub of rail, light rail, ferry and bus transportation 
for  the bustling city of 40,000.  
"That terminal is considered one of the most important transportation  
stations in the country," Roberts said. "It became an enormous location for  
commerce."  
Decades after the clock tower was taken down, it was replaced on its original 
 footprint by a tall, antenna-like radio tower with none of the old spire's  
architectural charm.  
"It's just a steel skeletal structure where they put some radio equipment on  
it," the mayor said. "There's no architectural value to it at all."  
Frank Smolar, NJ Transit's director of project management, said replacing the 
 clock tower is considered an integral part of the terminal's rehabilitation. 
 
"The clock tower is a symbol of the ferry terminal," he said. "It's probably  
the strongest architectural component that was part of the original 
terminal."  
Smolar and NJ Transit spokesman Dan Stessel said the $5.5 million clock tower 
 project is expected to begin later this year and be completed by next 
summer.  
The renovation of the terminal began in 1999 and will continue until at least 
 2008, NJ Transit officials said.  
Completed work includes structural repairs to ferry slips and rehabilitation  
of the interior of the terminal, including a restored waiting room and  
improvements to the concourse area.  
NJ Transit has hired a real estate development consultant, LCOR of Berwyn,  
Pa., to help plan the redevelopment of the 65-acre rail yard adjacent to 
Hoboken  Terminal as a retail, commercial and residential complex.  
Under the terminal rehabilitation, five of the six original ferry slips will  
be restored and returned to use, replacing the temporary barges where  
Manhattan-bound ferries now anchor. The sixth slip is to become a terminal  museum.  
Ferries from Hoboken Terminal provided a vital rail-water link to Manhattan  
throughout the first half of last century, but ferry service was scuttled in  
1967 because of declining ridership. It was restored in 1989, however, and  
ferries once again are an important mass-transit option for trans-Hudson  
travelers.  
Roberts, meanwhile, said he is just anxious to have the clock tower project  
completed.  
"I can't wait until next spring," the 49-year-old mayor said. "It will be the 
 first time in my life I'll be able to see it."  
Rudy Larini may be reached at rlarini_@_starledger.com or (973)  392-4253. 

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The Railroad Station Historical Society maintains a database of existing
railroad structures at: http://www.rrshs.org

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