Mourning the Old Flatbush Terminal
Doesn’t this photo of the old Flatbush Avenue Terminal just make you want to cry? Kevin Walsh of Forgotten NY brought this photo (and the others on this website) to our attention. (That’s One Hanson aka the Williamsburgh Savings Bank in the background.) The passenger station opened in 1907 and was completely refurbished in the…
Doesn’t this photo of the old Flatbush Avenue Terminal just make you want to cry? Kevin Walsh of Forgotten NY brought this photo (and the others on this website) to our attention. (That’s One Hanson aka the Williamsburgh Savings Bank in the background.) The passenger station opened in 1907 and was completely refurbished in the 1940s; like many historic structures in Brooklyn, the terminal was allowed to deteriorate in the 1960s and 1970s and the Transit Authority tore it down in the mid-1980s. What a waste.
The keystones sometimes seen on LIRR paraphernalia from 1900-1960 or so was b/c of the Pennsylvainia RR, which owned the LIRR in those years.
http://www.forgotten-ny.com
Brenda;
When Mr. Walsh first started his website, he was exactly what you state above, and I enjoyed it immensely. I also have a curiosity about history and artifacts from the past.
Over the past two years, however, he has let his fame get to his head, and he often pontificates on development in this city. I have YET to find ONE instance where he praises any new development. His writing has become shrill to the point where he once wrote that he wishes to spit on anyone who lives in a Fedders home. Finally, his writing borders on xenophobia when he writes on Asian areas. His disdain for fedders skirts awfully close to contempt when discussing what Asian immigrants are doing to areas like his Flushing.
Benson–
There is no person *like* Kevin Walsh (that I’ve ever met) except Kevin–but all of us who share a passion for “bygone eras” and their remnants indulge in celebrating as well as lamenting, thanks to the rich deposit of wonderful stuff (and some P’s-O-S) from the past that HAS survived. Kevin is not one of those annoying types who long for the creepy, crappy days of yore when all was idyllically “gritty,” nor is he one of those whiny auld Brooklyn nostalgists who go on endlessly about egg creams and Dodgers back in the day (usually while ensconced in Florida someplace). He’s got a quite pure curiosity to identify and collect surviving traces of the past that, unlike the “Tip-Top Barbershop,” have not been erased. Your mentioning of your uncle’s vanished workplace betrays you as, perhaps, a kindred spirit; you might want to join a Forgottener tour before you diss the history detectives!
Totally a waste!
It echoes of the Penn Station story as well. I guess what we have left of grand transit stations is well, Grand Central Station.
Explain to me why the new station has no automatic doors. Explain to me how it is handicapped accessible. Explain to me why half the doors it does have are always blocked off with emergency tape that seems to indicate they are broken.
I’ve seriously stopped using the new entrance because I can’t stop wondering about this.
Old LIRR terminal?
P-O-S. Glad it’s gone.
I wonder how it is to be a person like Kevin Walsh, where you spend your entire life lamenting by-gone eras that were not so great.
My uncle worked in a barber shop across the street, where PC Richard’s now stands. It was called “Tip-Top”.
> And its ghastly design makes us squirm and all.
Kudos to BfF!
I’ve got a couple of postcards of this station from way back. It had class, but was never Grand Central. The el train tracks used to come right across the street, servicing one or more of the train lines now underground. Plus the kiosk in the triangle was open and a subway entrance too. The postcards are from the teens and 20’s. This picture above shows it in its last days, covered in signage and the grand arched entryways partially closed off with higglety-pigelty small windows and openings. It was just ignored to death, and then deemed too ugly to keep. By the time I moved here, they had the tin shack.
The new station is, of course, better than a tin shack, and goes well with Ratner’s malls, so it’s not unpleasing in that regard. I suppose one could speculate that if the original station had been restored, the mall would look completely different, that is, if the architect had decided to design something somewhat contextural, or complimentary to the station. That would be a big if, given Ratner’s usual regard for existing buildings and neighborhoods.
I also sort of miss the corrugated tin shanty that was there for a good decade.