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You’ve heard of the secret train system in DC, you’ve heard of the secret train
platform in London, but have you heard of the secret train station in New York?
I hope not because that’s this week’s dose of content.
Let’s rewind 150 years to the era of not planes, trains, and not automobiles.
In this time, the railroads coming from the north into New York City ended up at Grand
Central Depot.
This massive rail yard took up more than a dozen city-blocks in one of New York’s densest
areas and so the owners of the station, the New York Central Railroad, saw an opportunity.
They would put the entire rail yard underground, build a huge new station, sell all the freed
up real estate, and get that bread.
10 years and 85 million cubic feet of dirt later Grand Central Terminal opened and it
was actually pretty neat.
It has more tracks and platforms than any other station in the world and today includes
all sort of non-rail related things like a tennis club in the ceiling which was once
run by a certain future US president.
The station also had at one point, and this is true, a 65 foot indoor ski slope.
As this implies, Grand Central was long at the center of American opulence as much of
the country’s early wealth was earned by rail tycoons.
Given that, on top of the now buried tracks, plenty of important buildings sprang up.
In the area that was once the rail yards there is today the headquarters of the Colgate-Palmolive
Company, JP Morgan, MetLife, Major League Baseball, and also the Waldorf Astoria hotel.
This hotel has long been considered one of the world’s most prestigious and has been
stayed at by countless celebrities.
Up until 2015, when the hotel was bought by a Chinese company, the Waldorf Astoria was
the place where US presidents stayed when they made their frequent visits to New York.
The hotel has a lavish Presidential Suite that’s been stayed in by every US president
between Herbert Hoover and Barack Obama and non-presidents like the Kings of Jordan, Saudi
Arabia, Spain, and Norway, the Queen of England, the Emperor of Japan, General Charles de Gaulle
of France, and more.
While it costs the general public between $4,000 and $8,000 to stay there per night,
the hotel gives a generous discount to the US government and, by extension, the American
taxpayer, and the room is even designed to emulate the style of the White House.
Conveniently, the room is also about 500 feet above the Grand Central Tracks buried more
than 100 years ago.
Now, back in a time before private jets, the way that America’s richest and most powerful
individuals got around without mingling with the normals was by private rail car.
These would be hitched to the back of public trains and included dining rooms, kitchens,
large bedrooms, lounges, and more.
In the same way that US presidential candidates now often do speeches at airports in front
of their planes, in the past candidates would do whistle-stop tours where they would make
short speeches in small towns across America from the back of private rail-cars.
Roosevelt was a particular fan of using these trains.
Due to polio-induced paralysis, the bottom half of his body didn’t work but he did
serve twice as many terms as any other US president so, equal?
Unbelievably though, he was able to hide his handicap from most of the American public
through careful coordination at events and the cooperation of the press.
That’s why whenever he was seen standing he was holding on to someone or something.
Giving speeches from the back of a railcar was therefore easy as he didn’t have to
go far in public.
While nowadays presidents fly on Air Force One to New York, Roosevelt would often make
the trip by rail but arriving in Grand Central Station would be far too public to hide his
ailment.
His train therefore stopped a third of a mile short of Grand Central and was shunted to
a small secret platform directly below the Waldorf Astoria hotel.
From there, an elevator would take him up into the hotel.
It’s unclear how many times FDR used this secret station as it was, of course, secret
but its believed to have been used by plenty of presidents and celebrities since his era.
The secret platform and elevator still exists today and, while its existence is no longer
secret, we’re not always sure what it’s being used for.
This inconspicuous door on 50th street is reportedly the entrance to the elevator down
to the platform.
We do know for sure that the platform has been used at least once in recent decades
while a US president has stayed at the Waldorf Astoria.
In 2003, while President Bush was staying there for a United Nations General Assembly
session, an idling Metro-North train was kept at this platform ready to shuttle the president
off Manhattan at any moment in case of emergency.
While not confirmed, it’s assumed that this procedure is repeated whenever presidents
visit the Waldorf Astoria nowadays.
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