by Lloyd Clark
The building at the end of Fourth Avenue
that fronts on Harrison Street has a special place in my memory. The Phoenix
Union Station is where I first set foot in Phoenix, stepping off a Southern
Pacific coach at 1:30am on a chilly Sunday, February 1, 1948.
Opened in 1923, the structure served until three years ago as the arrival and departure point for rail travelers in and out of Arizona's capital. A report that this edifice might be subject to demolition prompted my attendance on June 4th of a rally instigated by Phoenix City Councilman Phil Gordon.
Some 70 persons assembled that Saturday morning in front of the closed station. Television and still photographers had a background identifier over the building's entrance: "Union Station -- Amtrak Rail Passenger Station," although it ceased serving train riders on June 2, 1996 after the last westbound Amtrak train departed.
Councilman Gordon announced that he is concerned that the Maricopa County supervisors may not be as attentive to preserving historic structures as he and others are. These others include numerous groups and individuals who consider the Jackson Street Warehouse District an integral part of Phoenix's history. The district is within the original Phoenix Townsite -- bordered on the north by Van Buren Street; the south by Harrison, east by Seventh Street (initially named Apache), and on the west by Seventh Avenue (Yavapai).
Negative reactions were recently generated among preservationists when county planners proposed construction of a new jail, parking garage, and a morgue in the area. Supervisor Mary Rose Wilcox, whose District 5 includes the sites under consideration, said the Union Station will not be demolished.
As the crowd gathered around Councilmen Gordon and Doug Lingner, noise from jet aircraft taking off westerly from Sky Harbor Airport provided a fitting dirge to the demise of rail passenger service. (The city's obsessive catering to airlines played a significant role in the discontinuance of Amtrak service.)
I asked Mr. Gordon if any effort is being made by government representatives to restore passenger service to Phoenix. He said he is not exerting any such effort. Radio and TV news reporters' taping of his reply was drowned out by the noise of a commercial aircraft gaining altitude.
It seemed odd to me that a man who professes interest in historic preservation should not be concerned with a historic mode of transportation.
A significant number of travelers recognize the ease of access to railroad cars in which wide reclining seats are placed in leg-stretching intervals. Passengers can move about the cars freely and be served full-course meals. It is such a pleasant contrast to the frenetic baggage-checking security-clearing boarding-stashing carry-on-luggage buckling-up in cramped spaces with peanut-and-snacks system of airline travel.
It was ironic that remarks about the need for rail passenger accomodations in the sixth most populous city in the nation fell on deaf ears... even without the roar of aircraft drowning out the quest to get Phoenix back on track.
photo: A forlorn cross-buck guards unused freight sidings in front of Union Station, where Amtrak trains no longer call.
See also: Whither Warehouse? in the Phoenix New Times
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