The Grand Penn Group Alliance (GPCA) offered its proposal for renovating Penn Station on the New York Historic on Tuesday, March 11, outlining a return to the unique transit hub’s pre-demolition Beaux Arts glory and a complete relocation of Madison Sq. Backyard (MSG), amongst different options.
Led by former New York Metropolis Chief of City Design Alexandros Washburn and funded by the Nationwide Civic Artwork Society (NCAS), a Washington, DC, nonprofit that advocates for classical structure in federal buildings, the proposal seems to construct on President Trump’s push for classical federal structure amid Penn Station’s slow-moving enlargement plans. Governor Hochul spoke with Trump about allotting federal {dollars} for enhancing the station final November after he was elected.
The board of the NCAS, shaped in 2002, consists of Thomas D. Klingenstein — a far-right political scientist, Trump ally, and board chair of the conservative Claremont Institute suppose tank who poured over $10.5 million in contributions to Republican campaigns and PACs through the 2024 election season.
A public plaza with a fountain would substitute Madison Sq. Backyard, which might be moved to the place Lodge Pennsylvania as soon as stood.
The renderings launched by the Grand Penn Group Alliance present a classical façade lined with Doric columns in entrance of Vornado Realty Belief’s PENN 2 enterprise heart on the station’s Seventh Avenue entrance. GPCA’s proposal would additionally stage the contentious Madison Sq. Backyard’s round fashionable structure totally to make manner for a grassy public plaza that’s roughly the dimensions of Bryant Park and accessorized by a fountain.
Regardless of being probably the most well-known leisure and sports activities venue on this planet, MSG sparked worldwide outrage for its position within the demolition of the unique Beaux Arts-style Penn Station’s quarters in 1963. Loathed by many, the venue that opened in 1968 compelled the station to depend on its underground core, prompting structure historian Vincent Scully to remark that “One entered the city like a god. One scuttles in now like a rat.”
In an interview with Hyperallergic, NCAS President Justin Shubow recalled that late New York Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan known as the unique station’s demolition “the greatest single act of vandalism in the history of New York.”
The commuter corridor evokes the aesthetics of the unique Penn Station, full with a reproduction of the big clock.
In 2013, the Manhattan Group Board 5 voted to impose a 10-year time restrict on the sector’s working allow quite than permitting it to run in perpetuity. A number of structure corporations proposed the relocation of the venue in bids to renovate and broaden Penn Station, and in 2023, the identical neighborhood board solely afforded MSG a five-year working allow, closing in on the positioning’s eventual relocation for the station’s profit.
That very same yr, the MSG’s Govt Vice President Joel Fisher steered that the venue can be amenable to shifting throughout the road on Seventh Avenue, the place the world-famous and now-demolished Lodge Pennsylvania as soon as stood. The plot additionally belongs to Vornado, which intends to develop the positioning, dubbed PENN15, right into a skyscraping workplace tower when market circumstances align with the plan.
Hyperallergic contacted Vornado Realty Belief and the Madison Sq. Backyard Leisure Company for remark. Along with MSG’s relocation, the Alliance’s renderings for the Commuter Corridor evoke the unique Penn Station concourse’s excessive ceilings and iron and glass entrances — full with a reproduction of the unique clock — that may hook up with the Moynihan Prepare Corridor throughout the James A. Farley Publish Workplace via an underground tunnel. The boarding concourse would characteristic 18-foot excessive ceilings and a number of elevators and escalators as properly.
The boarding concourse would have 18-foot excessive ceilings and a number of elevators and escalators.
Washburn, a chief architect of the Moynihan Prepare Corridor improvement, estimates that the Penn Station overhaul would value about $7.5 billion, with $3.5 billion dedicated to the relocation of MSG. Within the FAQ part of GPCA’s web site for the venture, the Alliance notes that the associated fee estimate is “should cost $1 billion less than the schemes proposed by New York State and Amtrak,” each of which depart MSG above the station.
“What we’re doing here is ultimately a civic move,” Washburn mentioned in a telephone name with Hyperallergic, pointing on to the Ephebic oath for Classical Athenian youths that pledged to go away their metropolis higher than how they discovered it.
As regards to Penn Station’s changing into a hub for unsheltered folks, particularly for the reason that COVID-19 pandemic, Washburn mentioned that public restrooms and public seating have been unquestionably included within the proposal, “whereas many designers simply take out [those amenities] because they don’t want to deal with the issue.”
In response to potential apprehension towards each President Trump’s involvement in addition to the controversial name again to classical structure, each Shubow and Washburn stood by recalling the unique station’s memorable look.
A proposal rendering of the general public plaza forward of the glass entrance to Penn Station
“If people object to the architecture, well, they’re welcome to do so. But if President Trump gets involved, that doesn’t mean that we’re not going to get a wonderful station,” Shubow mentioned. “The design speaks for itself — regardless of what people might think about Trump’s politics, this is something that will make all New Yorkers proud.”
Washburn, who’s half Greek, shared that “classical architecture comes naturally” for him, and expressed that the shape works as an “interaction between the natural and the classical,” citing the Corinthian column’s use of the acanthus leaf motif as one instance.
In January, Trump issued a memorandum titled “Promoting Beautiful Federal Civic Architecture” that known as for “regional, traditional, and classical architectural” designs. The memo prompted speedy pushback from teams together with the American Institute of Architects, who mentioned the president’s preferences might stifle architectural freedom and innovation.