Where Gumbo Was #428
This is a story about the past and the future. The future is Philadelphia’s Rail Park and its plans to become a three-mile stroller’s paradise with elevated sections and a tunnel.
The past is the Reading Railroad’s viaduct and terminal; the remains of the viaduct are the raw material for a new park that will rival its models, New York’s High Line and the Promenade Plantée in Paris. Congratulations to GeorgeG and to PortMoresby, who recognized our mystery location!
Waiting wistfully for the future…
Like many cities that once depended heavily on rail traffic and encouraged railroads to build large terminals and multiple lines, Philadelphia in the late 20th century found itself with a surplus of facilities, often in highly valuable real estate. In some cities, stations were demolished.
Reading Terminal then and now
Philadelphia’s landmark Reading Terminal was spared that fate; it became the Pennsylvania Convention Center. And the Reading Terminal Market, itself an urban tradition and older than the terminal, continues to draw crowds to its stands under the former trainshed.
End of the line: this is where the viaduct was truncated at Vine Street
But the massive viaduct that brought the two branches of the Reading Railroad’s main lines and commuter lines into the station had no purpose once mainline service ended and the commuter lines went underground. The last trains ran on the viaduct in 1984, and the last three blocks of it before the terminal were removed.
After several years of advocacy, fundraising and planning, Friends of the Rail Park got the okay to go ahead with work, and after two years of construction, Phase 1 opened in the summer of 2018. An aerial view shows how small a start Phase 1 is, compared to the whole route, but it’s popular and its popularity builds support for its extension.
This aerial view shows how small Rail Park is now; eventually it hopes to extend three miles to the right, ending near the Schuylkill River.
Rail Park’s design pays homage to its railroad origins with gantry-like structures that are designed to call to mind the structures that carried the overhead electric wires once the railroad was electrified.
Despite being technically an ‘urban linear park,’ the design avoids being too linear, with pathways at different angles and a variety of places to sit, stretch or give a performance.
Both from on the street, and from within the park, the urban setting is never far; as a park, it is a journey through a former industrial district rather than an escape from it.
And, at one end of the park, an unusual sculpture commemorates the many companies and products that came from the district along North Broad and Callowhill—including not only the railroads, but also two of the biggest American locomotive builders, Baldwin and American Locomotive.
The neighborhood is full of other reminders of the ‘old days,’ including the arches that allowed the neighborhood’s streets to pass under the trains.
And now, if you’ll excuse me a moment, it’s railfan time. And if you can’t excuse me, feel free to move on and ignore these views of trains operating on the viaduct.
Notice that all of the next four images were made at approximately the same spot, showing the edge of the Reading Terminal train shed at the upper right.
Great repurposing of abandoned rail lines into parks and trails. Our local small town did the same, but I walked the abandoned rails that were beyond the trail’s end along with abandoned rail stations.