Dave's Depots - Union Station, Saint Louis, Missouri

For today's installment, we take a look at St. Louis Union Station. Union Station in Saint Louis was built by the Terminal Railroad Association of St. Louis (TRRA). The TRRA is a unique operation whose owners are its users, though all of its users do not own the railroad. All users, including owners, pay the railroad for the services they use. The TRRA treats all users, even non-owners equally in regard to access to the routes, bridges, and right-of-way.

The cornerstone of the station was laid on July 8, 1893 and construction began on the $6.5 million complex. When construction was completed and the station opened on September 1, 1894, Railroad Gazette declared that the station was one of the largest in the world, in term of track facilities.

The station sits on Market Street, a major east-west street in downtown. The head house was designed by a local architect, Theodore Link, who won a $10,000.00 award for his Richardson-Romanesque Design.

Behind the station is a massive train shed that covered 32 tracks. Later, 10 additional tracks were built just west of the train shed and covered by umbrella sheds. In total, the station's 42 stub-end tracks had a capacity of around 539 80-foot passenger cars. In addition to the head house and train shed, the station boasted a power house, separate express, baggage, and mail handling facilities, and a large subway tunnel under the 42 tracks to allow quick transportation of baggage and mail wagons next door. (The subway is now used by the Metrolink light rail system).

Near the station, at 14th Street, the TRRA built an engine service facility to service locomotives that arrived at the station. Some railroads, such as the L&N preferred to service their own power at their own East St. Louis, IL roundhouse, instead of paying TRRA to use their facility. As a result, passenger trains from Louisville or Nashville would have their road locomotives cut off at Relay Depot in East St. Louis, and be pulled over the Eads Bridge into Saint Louis by a TRRA 0-6-0.

TRRA Tower One controlled all movements into and out of the station. The tower controlled 315 switches and 315 signals into the station. The original Tower One burned on July 22, 1940, forcing the TRRA to hire an additional 100 switchmen to handle the 107 inbound and 106 outbound daily departures. The new Tower One was dedicated on November 30, 1940. The shell of this structure still stands, but is largely inaccessible.

During World War II, the station handled 315 trains and 100,000 passengers every day. After World War II, the station suffered what Trains Magazine's editor David P. Morgan termed "Execution by Expressway." By Amtrak Day on May 1, 1971, only six railroads continued to operate passenger trains into St. Louis Union Station, with 11 daily arrivals and departures.

By the end of the 1970s, TRRA sold the station and its train shed to a private developer, and Amtrak moved out to a "temporary" station (which served until 2004). The tracks were torn up and the station languished until its conversion into a retail/hotel complex in the 1980s.