Time Machine: Union Passenger Station

CEDAR RAPIDS - Cedar Rapids' union depot was a small, unattractive building that hardly suited a growing city.

In 1891, a Gazette reporter asked an official of the Northwestern railroad about the possibility of a new depot.

'The time is coming when Cedar Rapids will have the finest union depot on the line of the Northwestern between Chicago and Omaha, and one of which the people will be proud,” said the official. 'Cedar Rapids is growing rapidly now and we have just simply been waiting until we could put up a building that would meet all requirements and demands, no matter how large the city might grow.”

Rumors that Cedar Rapids would have a new passenger depot solidified into fact in March 1896 when tenants on land between Third and Fifth avenues were notified that they needed to vacate. Much of the property had already been purchased to build a subway under the Fourth Street tracks, but that project proved impractical. Plans for the new train station moved forward as the remaining land was purchased or condemned.

Persistent rumors that the station really was going to the west side of the river didn't hold water, but there was concern that closing Fourth Avenue would severely curtail the expansion of business to the south. By December 1896, the misgivings had mostly dissipated.

'After many and long patient years of waiting, the fondest hope of the Cedar Rapids people is to be consummated in the opening of the new and magnificent union passenger station,” reported The Gazette. 'And right here allow The Gazette to suggest that this highly prized structure be known as the Union Passenger Station.

'Architecturally it is all that could be asked for, and adds much to the beauty of the Parlor City. It is built of the finest pressed brick, trimmed with cut stone and adorned with gargoyles that are works of art. It is nearly 600 feet in length, equipped with splendid constructed trainsheds, and its exterior view is pleasing to the eye. The interior is provided with apartments for the various departments which will make their home there; with ticket and baggage rooms, complete in every particular and very commodious; with waiting rooms, large, light and cheery, elegantly furnished with toilets and other necessary appurtenances. Travelers also will have an opportunity to secure their lunches in the station, and smokers also will find special accommodations.”

The central portion of the main building was 40 by 400 feet and 27 feet high. At either end were two immense fireplaces of red Portage Entry stone set in carved oak mantels. The station was heated by two large boilers in the basement that transferred steam heat into radiators, some of them circular and covered with marble.

The station custodian was provided a residence to the west of the station, behind which was a building that housed a laundry facility and apartments for station employees.

Officials of the Chicago & Northwestern and the Burlington, Cedar Rapids & Northern railroads, builders and owners of the new structure, deferred to local charities to plan and execute the station's formal opening. The result was a gala unprecedented in the city's history on Jan. 27, 1897. Proceeds from an evening of dining and dancing in the new terminal benefited the city's Associated Charities.

Among the many famous people who passed through the station, one of the most well-known came annually for more than a decade from the 1940s into the 1950s. Thousands of children greeted the Easter Bunny as he arrived at Union Station each spring and boarded a float in a parade to take him to his home at Killian's department store's 'Easter Bunnyland.”

In 1957, the North Western Railroad had two new leaders. B.W. Heineman, board chairman, and C.J. Fitzpatrick, president, had been running the railroad for a little less than a year when they visited Cedar Rapids. Even after they were told that Grant Wood thought Union Station was a fine example of Tudor architecture, they pronounced it an eyesore. Cedar Rapids could get by with a much smaller station, they said.

After serving the travel needs of Cedar Rapids for 65 years, the grand edifice was seen as obsolete. A campaign ensued to demolish it and make room for parking to accommodate the growing number of automobiles in the downtown area. An agreement was reached with the railroads to remove the station as well as nine of 11 tracks on Fifth Avenue, 5 of 7 on Third Avenue and one of four on First and Second avenues.

Union Station was sold to the city in the spring of 1961 for $315,000 and on June 26, 1961, bids for demolition were accepted. Hennessey Brothers of Cedar Rapids submitted the low bid of $9,400 to clear the area between Third and Fifth avenues and Third and Fifth streets SE. Fourth Avenue would then become a through street and the remaining area was designated for parking lots. Demolition began on July 3.

The station was replaced by a smaller Rock Island passenger station at 500 Fourth St. NE on July 1, 1961. Ironically, the 30 by 180 foot building cost about $85,000 to construct, nearly the same amount as the grand Union Station's base cost of $86,000.

The railroad crossing on Fourth Avenue was finished on Nov. 30 and through traffic flowed one way - westbound - on Dec. 1, 1961. When the new parking lot was dedicated a week later, Sutherland Dows, a member of the Fourth Street Committee, said, 'The depot was built 65 years ago because Cedar Rapids was a great place to live. ... I won't be here 65 years from now, but I hope that this present project is just as obsolete then as the Union depot is now.”