Now I happened to listen to two Podcast and it was the one about Penn Station and the one about GCT. I loved the podcast on GCT cause they discussed about Grand Centrals transitions from Grand Central Depot to Station and finally to Terminal. The Bowery boys, I will have to say have this chemistry that flows so well that it makes their podcast quite enjoyable.

I do agree with them that the Pennsylvania RR was the most influential RR in america today since it is cause of them that many trains can think of entering NYC with no problem.

although, the Bowery boys were discussing somethings that I had already learned about, it was interesting to hear how described it and how they spin it from their own point of view.

I enjoyed watching this group discussion since you able to get so many point of views at one time. but just as I had stated in class, I had one issue. That issue was the fact that nobody mentions the fact that Wilgus originally envisioned the need for Grand Central to go electric back in 1900 but his ideas were pushed aside and overlooked. It wasn’t until the accident of 1902 when the board realized that Wilgus’ ideas were pinnacle in GCT’s survival and that if they had listened to him in the first place, they wouldn’t have been in that mess of a situation.

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The wilgus papers collection is a source that is way more than useful it is quite integral when doing research on Grand Central Terminal and electrification. Prior to reveiwing this collection, I was wondering where I would find research sources on GCT and its tradition into the electric world but with this collection, it has mad researching this topic quite simpler. Now the use of the key terms and subjects as an organizing tool is quite effective and also makes finding specific research sources quite easy. This tool is very useful, I would recommend this to anyone who wants to do research on GCT and its magnificent architecture and engineering.

Penn Station was definitely a structure of grandeur, through this video it shows the stations beauty and at the same time it showed the ordeal it took t o get this station up in the air. Cassatt took the inspiration from  the stations of Europe in regards to their electric trains that travel through long tunnels and causing little discomfort to its customers. Now Penn Station was great and in it creation, there succeeded the connection of their tracks in jersey to NYC and the connection of their newly acquired train line in Long Island (LIRR). So now, the question is why did GCT survive over Penn Station, I believe it dealt with the innovation of GCT’s architecture, its importance to its surrounding neighborhood, its pinnacle use in US history. But one of the major factors that helped save GCT was the destruction of Penn Station itself. New Yorkers truly realized what they had lost when Penn Station and so did a large portion of the nation and through this loss so many came together to fight for the cause of saving GCT and in result causing the formulation of NYC Landmark Preservation Commission. Penn Station lacked a large support from NYC citizens and the support from major celebrities, which GCT had and it was along with these two factors that helped propel its salvation forward. There also lies one more factor that differed between Penn Station and GCT and that was the fact that GCT had sub-connections to many of the surrounding buildings which allowed commuters/tourists to feel like they were in a city within a city (known as Terminal City).

In regards to the archives, what I first noticed is that not many of the employees in the MTA building know of its existence. My experience in the archive alone was amazing, due to the fact that I had the chance to handle photos that were not only beautiful but older than myself and were in superb condition. I also looked over expense logs for GCT, in these logs you could find minor repairs/modifications.

Found two sources at the archive:

1. Watson, E. Correspondence land. 1965 – 1976.

I found this source interesting because I saw that watson had interesting ideas for a change in brooklyn and some maps of brooklyn neighborhoods.

1.  NY Central System. Grand central terminal. 1964 – 1968.

This source showed interesting moment at GCT but i found it really interesting that the book was in really great condition for how old it was.

The museum visit taught me a lot, and has allowed me to look at public transportation much differently.

in this photo, It shows a fact that really intrigued, which was that the first woman to drive a bus for the mta, got behind the wheel for the first time in 1973. A tremendous fact.

This photo is of multiple photos of city hall train station and it reminds me of gustivino tiles and to be honest, I wouldn’t be surprised if they were actually gustivino tiles.

I find the generations of turnstiles extremely interesting. To see where it started from and to where it is now, is quite incredible.

During our second tour, I didn’t known what to expect that I would learn and if it would interest me. Now, on a very surprising note I genuinely did learn some things that I find quite interesting. If you see the two photos below, they depict some of the things I found quite interesting.

the picture above is an old train schedule and the fact that it is still preserved and in great condition plus with what seemed to be chalk writing is still visible and that is incredible.

This photo above is of the remaining buildings from terminal city. Terminal city was composed of building that were built on the real estate that GCT created when they covered their rail yards. All these building in terminal city were once connected to one another and GCT, which meant that one didn’t even have to step outside on the street unless they undyingly wanted to see the rest of NYC