It gives me tremendous pleasure to announce the springtime publication of a book about a most unique train ride that chugged through our area nearly 65 years ago. In April 1945, a train hauling the giant bronze casket of Franklin Delano Roosevelt–not to mention some A-plus list political figures, including all nine Supreme Court justices, the entire Cabinet, ample Secret Service and perhaps even a KGB spy–made its way from Georgia up to Hyde Park, New York.

FDR’s Funeral Train: A Betrayed Widow, a Soviet Spy, and a Presidency in the Balance follows the high-wattage entourage as it wends its way along its 1,000 mile journey to Roosevelt’s final resting place. MacMillan publishes it in April and you can pre-order it on Amazon.

What makes me super-psyched is not just that the historic train ride at times went over Metro-North, New Jersey Transit and LIRR rails–unbeknownst to a sleeping Tri-State area, no less–but that it’s authored by Robert Klara–known to early Trainjotting readers as Engine Bob.

Klara penned the popular “Ask Engine Bob” column–exquisitely detailed and humorous answers to readers’ questions about railroad travel, Grand Central infrastructure and history, and train policy, in 2007. In fact, one column, about the mysteriously hidden Track 61 in Grand Central, actually touches on FDR riding the hidden rails into Grand Central and, we’d like to think, was the impetus for Klara’s book. We got some mad traffic on that one after Matt Lauer poked around on Track 61 on a special investigative Today show.

Engine Bob wrote: Arriving in the private Presidential railroad car-often arriving from his boyhood home in Hyde Park, just up the Hudson Line-FDR and his entourage would pull up to Track 61, alight, and take the elevator straight up to the hotel’s Presidential Suite. It must have been something to see.

Rob is also a good friend and, with TJ’s Rolodex lousy with wordsmiths, one of the top 2 or 3 writers I know. Rob is the kind of guy whose idea of a perfect Saturday is leafing through stacks of yellowing periodicals in the bowels of the New York Public Library to unearth heretofore little or unknown tidbits about New York history.

Like the tenacious reporter he is, Klara got a bunch of previously classified Secret Service documents declassified, and had some crazy fun with it. I can’t wait to see what Engine Bob comes up with.

By way of a synopsis:

Most commuters on Metro North, New Jersey Transit, and the LIRR are vaguely aware that the tracks they’re riding on have a history that predates the MTA. But check this out: Back during WWII, these lines were also part the most top-secret railroad journey of the 20th Century. 

FDR’s Funeral Train, a new book scheduled for release by Palgrave Macmillan in April of 2010, tells the incredible story of the special train that took the body of Franklin D. Roosevelt from Warm Springs, Georgia (where he died suddenly on April 12, 1945) to Hyde Park, New York, his boyhood home where he wished to be buried. Of course, everyone in America knew that FDR had died, so what was so secret? Not only did the train carry Roosevelt’s remains in a 700-pound bronze casket, it also carried the entire federal government—key members of the House and Senate, the entire Cabinet, President Harry S. Truman, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, plus all nine justices of the Supreme Court.

FDR’s funeral train will be released to coincide with the 65th anniversary of FDR’s death. You can find the book at all major booksellers and at Amazon.com. (ISBN-13: 978-0-230-61914-2)

Q: Engine Bob, why don’t have they have a no cell-phone “quiet car” on Metro North, like they do on Amtrak? Surely, enough quiet-seeking commuters could fill a train car? 

A: What a fine, fine question. My fingers are twitching already. In fact, hang on a sec while I take another blood-pressure pill, because your question has just reminded me of the afternoon, last year, that I took a New Haven train home to Manhattan from South Norwalk and had to listen to a… um… Okay, she was one badass gangsta ho.

And, sitting in the seat across the aisle from mine, she proceeded to whip our her cell phone and call each and every one of her “Bridgeport girls” (about eight in all) and regale each of them with tales (spoken at full volume) of her latest man’s considerable endowment—and I’m not talking about his investments.

Stuck on a packed train and unwilling to give up my seat for fear of not finding another, I listened to the gum-popping young lady for nearly two hours, all the time listening to my own voice, buried deep within me, and whimpering: “Why, oh why, can’t Metro North have just one car on which cell phones are banned?” 

Why, indeed. After all, you say, doesn’t Amtrak have such no-cell-phone cars? Damn right, sir, yes they do. Just one disclaimer before I continue, okay? I am about to reiterate the railroad’s position on this issue—NOT defend it or even, frankly, attempt to explain it. Because it would take Nero Wolfe to decipher the wisdom of this one. 

Metro North’s position on the matter boils down to two arguments. First, everybody needs a seat. When trains are packed—as, during rush hours, we all know they are—the railroad can’t adopt restricted-use cars because these might preclude some passengers from having a seat. (Interestingly, the no-cell-phone cars on Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor trains operate along the same principle: Only on “non-capacity” trains where there are far more seats than passengers does the conductor have clearance to designate one of his coaches as a cell-phone-free zone.) Anyway, for Metro North, the policy is: All seats, all over the train, are for everyone. 

Yes, I know: Anyone CAN sit in a no-cell-phone car—he’s just not allowed to use his stinking cell phone when he does! Seems like a cogent enough argument. And it’s one that escorts me nicely to Metro North’s Argument No. 2. Are you ready? 

The First Amendment. 

Yes, this is what I was told when I pressed an MTA official on the cell-phone matter not too long ago. The railroad will not put itself in a position in which it risks being accused of restricting someone’s speech. But, you retort, the railroad would NOT be restricting speech—just the use of a device into which a passenger elects to speak. He could still say whatever he wishes to the open air, right? Removing a cell phone no more abridges the right of free speech than, say, removing a microphone from someone’s hand would—right? 

Right. But there comes a time when you know that even the best arguments are going to get you nowhere. And, with the Metro North official I’d managed to collar, I knew I had very quickly reached such a point. Argue all you want, Perry Mason, the policy’s not changing.

To be fair, the official was sympathetic: Yes, some people’s cell phone habits are deplorable, he said, and we’ve all “been there,” as he put it—meaning, presumably, stuck beside a Minnie Pearl who cackles into her phone all the way to Purdy’s. He also reminded me that Metro North conductors have of late been instructed to make a general announcement on crowded trains, asking people to please limit their cell-phone use “in consideration of your fellow passengers.” Such pleas, as we know, rank in effectiveness right up there with Manhattan’s jaywalking law—or the one strictly prohibiting the sale of Louis Vuitton knockoffs on Canal Street.

Meantime, sir, don’t get your hopes up about a no-cell-phone car on your train. Metro North is more likely to roll out a squash-court car first.

Q: Engine Bob, I commute to New Jersey from Penn Station, which means my train runs beneath the Hudson River. Somebody once told me that those tunnels are so shallow that they’re not anchored to anything and they “swing” like garden hoses as trains run through them. It does sort of feel like the train is bouncing as it runs thorough. Don’t tell me this story is true. 

A: Okay, I won’t—because it’s not. The bounce you’re feeling is, alas, only the bounce of the suspension assembly on the pair of wheel trucks of your train (Train cars have suspension just like automobiles do, because even though rails are obviously smoother than a paved road, your butt riding on a steel wheel that hits an inch-wide rail gap at 80 m.p.h. is going to feel it, so the wheel assemblies use springs or hydraulics to prevent you from getting wrinkles before your natural time.)  

But, like I said, the answer’s no: Those tunnels—there are two of them, each about 23 feet in diameter—do not bounce. There is some minor “play” to them, but bounce is a bit extreme. (That said, it’s true that plenty of transportation structures have sway coefficients factored in; the Manhattan Bridge, for example, flexes a few inches as the subways run across it. Prior to its recent renovation, it was actually moving several feet, but that was, uh, a problem.) 

Anyway, the true story of the purportedly bouncing tunnel is, however, almost as cool as the myth. Begun in 1903, those tunnels were the first real-world manifestations of an engineering patent granted to British engineer Charles Jacobs. His invention was called the “Tunnel Bridge,” actually.

Didn’t happen to notice a bridge when you were down there last? Well, here’s how it worked. Excavated for the Pennsylvania Railroad, the “North River Tunnels,” as they’d been known, were made of interlocking iron (and sometimes steel) rings that were bolted together behind a massive drilling shield, inside which workers hand-dug through the river silt that was kept from inundating them by a high-pressure atmosphere artificially created inside the tunnel by huge air compressors up on the ground. (When a worker failed to spend enough time in the pressure-equalizing airlock, he’d come down with “the bends,” which you might have heard of before.) 

The tunnels rest at varying depths below the bottom of the river but, much like your last blind date, are surprisingly shallow—usually buried only about 20 feet in the muck. The bedrock is much further down, but tunneling through rock would have been impossible not so much because of the difficulty of the drilling, but because the trains couldn’t (and still can’t) climb grades much steeper than 2%, and diving down to bedrock level from either Manhattan or New Jersey would have required a really steep descents and ascents, since the river’s only about a mile wide.

Yeah, even in the Olden Days, life was just as complicated. 

So that’s where the “bridge” part came in. Every 15 feet, workers fitted the iron rings of the advancing tunnel with a “bore segment.” This was a special ring through the bottom of which would pass a long, thick screw. The sandhogs would crank that screw straight down until it reached the bedrock, then they’d drill it in nice and tight (please, no second reference to your last blind date.) And that maneuver anchored the tunnels. 

So, imagine your commuting tunnel now: It runs through the river mud, but since the mud’s not thick enough to support the enormous weight of the tunnel and its trains, you’ve got what are essentially legs—pilings, really, like you see on a pier—that hold the tunnel up and keep it in place. Sorry, then—no bounce.

But what’s really amazing is that those tunnels have been down there for a century. Hundreds of trains a day run through. And still—all safe.  

I don’t know where Charles Jacobs is buried, but I’d leave him a nice bouquet if I knew. 

—E.B.

Q: If my Metro North train is on the underground level, why do I have to go to street level from the (underground) subway, only to descend again for my Metro North train? Shouldn’t I be able to stay underground when going from the subway to the Metro North?
 
A: Well, if you think about it, you do stay underground for some of the transfers. To get from the Shuttle platform into Grand Central, for example, one only ascends a single stretch of stairs to reach the western corridor into the upper concourse and the Metro North tracks—and you remain underground the entire time. 

But, yeah, okay, I’m being an annoying shit—you’re talking about the 4, 5, and 6 subways, aren’t you? You want to know why in hell does the MTA send you all the way up to the street level merely to prolong the Bataan Death March back down to your Metro North train?

Good question. But let me split just one more hair before I answer you. If you’re talking about transferring from the 4, 5, and 6 trains (a/k/a the Lexington Avenue Line) to Grand Central’s upper-level tracks, you are pretty much being sent no higher than you have to be. The upper-level commuter tracks lie at the bottom of a very gentle slope off the terminal’s main concourse—and the concourse level is exactly as high as you climb (from platform up to mezzanine, then from mezzanine via escalator to the eastern corridor of the terminal) as you leave the subway. 

But if you’re talking about getting off the subway and hoofing it for a Metro North train on the lower-level tracks, well, I feel your pain. Your aching knees, specifically. Why do you have to go up to go down? Isn’t a more direct connection possible? 

Short answer: No—There’s too much shit in the way. 

Long answer: No—now, proceed with below. 

Let’s just establish some parameters first—with the understanding that the figures I furnish are merely estimates. Here are some fun facts for your next commuter cocktail party:
* Grand Central upper level tracks:­ 1 story down (about 20 feet)
* Grand Central lower level tracks:­ 2 stories down (about 60 feet)
* Subway Shuttle: 2 stories down (about 50 feet)
* Subway 4, 5, and 6 Grand Central station:­ 2 stories down (about 50 feet)
* Subway No. 7 Flushing Line is one deep-ass train—about 80 feet below the street—and too far below Metro North’s tracks to make it useful to include here. 

Now, I’ve already dealt with the Shuttle so we’ll leave that out. Let’s look at the Lexington Avenue Subway—how deep it is, and also where it is. First, the terminal’s lower-level tracks and the Lexington Avenue Subway trains are almost exactly at the same depth: Score 1 for your argument that there really ought to be a straight-line connection without ascending to street level. 

Second, Grand Central platforms of the 4, 5, and 6 trains are actually built on a 45-degree diagonal relative to the avenues. (This is, incidentally, because the Park Avenue portion of the subway opened in 1904 but the Lexington Avenue extension north was not opened until 1918. The subway had to literally move over from Park Avenue to Lexington, and that connecting stretch was where the subway station was put in.) The 4, 5, and 6 stop for Grand Central roughly cuts diagonally beneath the southeastern corner of the Terminal proper—in easy reach of the commuter tracks toward the terminal’s eastern side: Score 2 for your argument. So, again, why the hell isn’t there one? 

As referenced above: There is too much shit in the way. If you were to try to dig a passage leading from the 4, 5, and 6 platforms right into, say, the general area of Tracks 101 – 103 on the terminal’s lower level, you’re talking about having to cut through the foundation walls of the old Commodore (now Grand Hyatt) Hotel, a task made more nightmarish by the tightly-spaced grid of support columns—needed to carry the weight of the building above—that run the length of the subway’s platforms. But okay, say that you somehow manage to snake some stairs around all those girders and I-beams. Next, you’d have to blast through the foundation wall of Grand Central Itself. Such a thing is possible, I suppose—but, finally, you’d run into the figurative boulder that cannot be moved. 

When the railroad’s chief engineer William J. Wilgus planned out the track arrangements for the new Grand Central Terminal in 1903, he had to find a way to turn trains around quickly within the tight confines of its interlock. Wilgus did this by designing loop tracks on both levels. The loop tunnels curve around below the terminal’s façade, connecting the westernmost and easternmost tracks in the shape of a large horseshoe [for more about the loops and how you can experience them with family and friends, refer to the Engine Bob installment that immediately precedes this one.] Those loops are not as quaint as they sound; they’re massive tunnels, two—and in places three—tracks wide, with massive load-bearing walls enclosing them on both sides. There is no conceivable way that the terminal could ever sacrifice the operational advantage of the loop tracks (much less run up an expense that would rival the gross national product of France) by ramming a pedestrian passageway through them. And because the loop is two-stories deep and swings to the laterally widest points of the terminal’s track grid, there’s simply no way around them. 

Other, that is, than being led above them, then back down on their other side—which is exactly what you are made to do right now.

Q: Engine Bob, the other day I was using the men’s room near the bottom of the escalators that lead to the food court downstairs at Grand Central. Suddenly, there was a low rumbling noise that got pretty loud—and then, seriously, the whole room started to shake. Guys were looking around to see what was going on. Do you know what it was? 

A: Consider yourself lucky. You heard a sound that rarely echoes through the bowels of the terminal anymore—or the bowels in the men’s room, for that matter. (Sorry, that was cheap but I had to take it.) Anyway, the reason for this other kind of shakin’ goin’ on at the urinals (sorry, that was cheap, too, but I had to take it) is this: About a foot away, on the other side of the wall to which was bolted the porcelain commode into which you were relieving yourself, a commuter train was rumbling past. Past? But, don’t all the trains stop at the platform ends that are, like, way far away from the men’s room? Most of them do. But not all of them.  Now, the difficulty at this point is that there are two ways to go on with this question. There’s the Joe Commuter Explanation, and the Train Geek one. I’m a train geek but you are my guest, so I’ll indulge the former first and make the latter an optional read. Ready?  Joe Commuter Explanation: The train you heard was using one of the loop tunnels, which hook like an umbrella handle around beneath the 42nd Street facade of the terminal. The Upper Level has a loop and so does the Lower. The loops connect the extreme outside tracks on either side of the terminal (just think of a huge “U” with the passenger concourse nestled in the center, near the bottom, and you’ll get the picture.) Back in the day, the loops allowed trains that had come head-first into the terminal to be turned around and then switched back into the platform tracks, ready for an outbound trip. These days, because Metro North trains can be run forward from either end, turning isn’t really necessary, but it’s sometimes still done as a way to get a train from one side of the terminal to the other without cutting in front of other trains. Okay, that’s it. Good enough? Now, skip past the next paragraph. Train Geek Explanation: Midtown Manhattan was too expensive for yard space, so the Central was forced to assemble and turn its trains up at the Mott Haven Yards, just north of the Hudson/Harlem split in the Bronx. But Mott Haven was a good five miles from the terminal, and dispatchers needed a quicker way to turn a train if necessary. Chances are the crack limiteds—which needed cleaning and commissary re-stocking—wouldn’t be turned in the loops. But the loop tracks were very useful for turning, say, an all-coach train as well as getting trains from revenue tracks over into the layup tracks along Lexington Avenue for storage or servicing. The loops were also great for moving engines around. While there is one loop for each level, each loop in turn contained an inner and outer track at its narrowest point. Tracks 38, 39, and 40 converged into the Upper Level Inner Loop; Tracks 41 and 42 would join to form the Upper Level Outer Loop. If you sent a train southbound down any of these tracks, it would re-emerge on the other (eastern) side as Tracks 1, 2, and 3—which were and are part of the layup tracks skirting Lexington Avenue and not in revenue service. Meanwhile, on the Lower Level, the arrangement was a bit more complex, with Tracks 115, 116, and 117 merging for the Lower Inner Loop and Tracks 119-125 converging for the Outer. However, the Inner Loop tracks would branch off at the centerpoint of the turn, feeding into Tracks 101-103; while the Outer Loop would continue on the larger arc and become Track 100, also part of the yard area on the extreme eastern side of the interlock. One of the Inner Loop tracks would also continue off to join the Outer Loop, past the centerpoint branch-off.

Whew.] 

So anyway, the loops were a great idea—and still are, if one used only rarely. I’ve got two more things to add (and I know: You were just using the little boy’s room and did not want this much information. But listen, okay, because this is cool).  First, the Lower Level Loop continues on past the men’s room and skirts behind the wall of the Oyster Bar’s bar and then, in the dining room, behind its kitchen. If you’re seeking to experience one of the better—and ever vanishing—Classic New York Moments, you can still have one while sitting in the Oyster Bar as a train rumbles through. The vibration and noise of the train wheels scraping on the rails brings a respectful hush over the room, and also, depending on where you’re sitting, creates little shockwaves in your martini or your water glass (the clam chowder is too thick for this effect, I’ve surmised). Finally, about a decade ago I was way down by the bumper posts of the lower level tracks and noticed that some of the rails leading to the loop were being ripped up. I’d been down there, with my camera, with the ultra-intelligent idea of actually walking around one of the loops. The sight of a pitch-black maw with NO clearance on either side of the tracks assisted me with changing my mind. But later, I was talking with a motorman friend and I asked him if he’d ever had the chance to “ride the loop” at the throttle of a train. “Oh yeah,” he said. “I used to take the old diesels around in there. It’s like another world, man, let me tell you, spooky.” He paused, then said, “It’s like driving a train on the moon.” 

Imagine. All of that—on the other side of the wall where you stood peeing.

Q: Some fellow LIRR travelers say that the conductors won’t hold the doors for a passenger who’s boarding in the morning with a cup of coffee in his or her hand, because that suggests they’re lackadaisical about making the train. But if you’re free-handed and running, they’ll be far more accommodating. Is that true, or is it merely an urban myth? 

A: This one’s hard to debunk fully, for one reason. I don’t think that the door-holding decision is a matter of policy or indoctrination; nor some practice commonly shared as a matter of tradition, conformity, or fraternalism. It’s personal, variable, and mutable. 

Which is to say: Yeah, it’s probably true. 

But it’s complicated, too—yes, I am actually saying that the issue of a coffee-clutching commuter is possessed of nuance. I can’t stick with a flat answer on this one. Let’s peel back a few lattes—I mean layers—and look more closely, shall we? 

When it comes to a conductor holding open doors, we’re talking about what is essentially a discretionary act. Technically, the doors are supposed to stay open only as long as it takes to disembark passengers and board new ones—ones that are ALREADY waiting on the platform. 

But here comes the exception right now: The inevitable she-idiot who’s 500 feet away, clopping across the parking lot on her stiletto heels, waving her knockoff Prada bag over her peroxided coif and yelling, “Wait! Waaaait! Hold that traaaaain!” 

You hate her. I hate her. And, I suspect, conductors hate her, too. But while you or I have fantasies of The Nassau Nag falling (Lee press-on nails and all) into a nice cozy nest of concertina wire, the conductor has a choice to make. 

If he holds the doors open a few more seconds, it probably won’t matter much in a railroading sense. If the train runs a pinch late as a result, the motorman can most likely make up the time on the straightaways or on the schedule-padded final few miles of the run. (See previous Engine Bob installment for the full explanation of schedule padding.)

However, there are significant limits to the conductor’s charity. Consider that there are bound to be runners at most station stops during the morning rush. Were the conductor to hold up the train for, say, 30 seconds each time he had a runner on his hands, now we’re looking at pulling into Penn Station 10 or more minutes late—not good. (Yes, I know what you’re thinking: “Dude, this is the Long Island Railroad; they don’t CARE about on-time performance.”

Point taken. But no conductor wants to be directly responsible for a late train, okay?)  

Remember, too, that during rush hour, you’ve got more trains sharing the tracks—schedules are tighter. Holding the door open on a lazy Sunday afternoon doesn’t matter much; holding it open on a Manhattan-bound express at 8:40 a.m. on a Monday DOES matter. 

So a conductor has a limited amount of door-holding indulgence he can mete out on a given run, and that means the issue comes down not only to a quantitative analysis, but a qualitative one, too: Some passengers will receive his graces, some will not. And only his subjectivity will determine who gets a seat and who gets the door. 

Based on my many years of riding the commuter lines and watching these scenarios all the time, I can say one thing for certain: pity counts. For a guy in a wheelchair: Door stays open. For a lone mother with four kids in tow: Door stays open. For an elderly couple teetering on their four-footed canes up the icy platform ramp: (Um, duh. Yes, the door stays open.) 

But for able-bodied commuters, the rules get tougher. And this is just the shadowy ground onto which your question falls. I hold that the conductor’s decision breaks along two considerations: If the would-be passenger is reasonably close to the platform (the 7-Eleven parking lot across the road is too far); and if the would-be passengers is making a visibly strident effort to reach the train. That means running. Show a little perspiration and a lot of desperation, and you’ll probably receive the conductor’s charity. 

Now, I personally don’t think that, considered by itself, the presence of absence of a cup of coffee in the tardy commuter’s hand is going to sway the decision very much in either direction. However, it does seem uncannily common that a Venti Starbucks splashing its soy-milk foam into the breeze just so very often happens to be in the hands of a perfumed and pretentious commuter who—whether because of the designer brew or not—is not the type to hurry up for anybody. He’s got a bad case of ’Tude, and let me ask you this: If you were a conductor and had the choice, would you reward it? 

In conclusion, then, I submit that the issue comes down to effort, whether or not java is part of the mix. The commuter who’s worried about spilling his $4 latte on his Bruno Maglis? The man who expects the train to wait but is barely quickening his step? The presumptuous lout who won’t move his ass a little faster for the sake of a thousand fellow commuters already aboard? The commuter who is—to use your term—lackadaisical?

In those instances, sir, I would put ten bucks on many a conductor thinking: “No way, bud. Learn to get here on time.” Then his key turns, the door shuts, and Mr. so-and-so can sip his espresso while he waits 32 minutes on a freezing platform for the next train. 

And don’t even try to tell me that that doesn’t look just a little bit like justice. 

Q: Engine Bob, why don’t have they have a no cell-phone “quiet car” on Metro North, like they do on Amtrak? Surely, enough quiet-seeking commuters could fill a train car? 

A: What a fine, fine question. My fingers are twitching already. In fact, hang on a sec while I take another blood-pressure pill, because your question has just reminded me of the afternoon, last year, that I took a New Haven train home to Manhattan from South Norwalk and had to listen to a… um… Okay, she was one badass gangsta ho.

And, sitting in the seat across the aisle from mine, she proceeded to whip our her cell phone and call each and every one of her “Bridgeport girls” (about eight in all) and regale each of them with tales (spoken at full volume) of her latest man’s considerable endowment—and I’m not talking about his investments.

Stuck on a packed train and unwilling to give up my seat for fear of not finding another, I listened to the gum-popping young lady for nearly two hours, all the time listening to my own voice, buried deep within me, and whimpering: “Why, oh why, can’t Metro North have just one car on which cell phones are banned?” 

Why, indeed. After all, you say, doesn’t Amtrak have such no-cell-phone cars? Damn right, sir, yes they do. Just one disclaimer before I continue, okay? I am about to reiterate the railroad’s position on this issue—NOT defend it or even, frankly, attempt to explain it. Because it would take Nero Wolfe to decipher the wisdom of this one. 

Metro North’s position on the matter boils down to two arguments. First, everybody needs a seat. When trains are packed—as, during rush hours, we all know they are—the railroad can’t adopt restricted-use cars because these might preclude some passengers from having a seat. (Interestingly, the no-cell-phone cars on Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor trains operate along the same principle: Only on “non-capacity” trains where there are far more seats than passengers does the conductor have clearance to designate one of his coaches as a cell-phone-free zone.) Anyway, for Metro North, the policy is: All seats, all over the train, are for everyone. 

Yes, I know: Anyone CAN sit in a no-cell-phone car—he’s just not allowed to use his stinking cell phone when he does! Seems like a cogent enough argument. And it’s one that escorts me nicely to Metro North’s Argument No. 2. Are you ready? 

The First Amendment. 

Yes, this is what I was told when I pressed an MTA official on the cell-phone matter not too long ago. The railroad will not put itself in a position in which it risks being accused of restricting someone’s speech. But, you retort, the railroad would NOT be restricting speech—just the use of a device into which a passenger elects to speak. He could still say whatever he wishes to the open air, right? Removing a cell phone no more abridges the right of free speech than, say, removing a microphone from someone’s hand would—right? 

Right. But there comes a time when you know that even the best arguments are going to get you nowhere. And, with the Metro North official I’d managed to collar, I knew I had very quickly reached such a point. Argue all you want, Perry Mason, the policy’s not changing.

To be fair, the official was sympathetic: Yes, some people’s cell phone habits are deplorable, he said, and we’ve all “been there,” as he put it—meaning, presumably, stuck beside a Minnie Pearl who cackles into her phone all the way to Purdy’s. He also reminded me that Metro North conductors have of late been instructed to make a general announcement on crowded trains, asking people to please limit their cell-phone use “in consideration of your fellow passengers.” Such pleas, as we know, rank in effectiveness right up there with Manhattan’s jaywalking law—or the one strictly prohibiting the sale of Louis Vuitton knockoffs on Canal Street.

Meantime, sir, don’t get your hopes up about a no-cell-phone car on your train. Metro North is more likely to roll out a squash-court car first.  

Q: Engine Bob, the other day I was waiting for my train in Grand Central, I looked up at the huge arch window above the concourse and saw what looked like someone walking around inside of it. What’s the deal? 

A: This may be a close to magic as the MTA is capable of. Well, no, actually, I guess true magic would be a reasonable monthly-commutation fare. But anyway, your eyes did not deceive you: It’s actually possible to walk about inside the concourse windows at Grand Central. 

The optical illusion is pretty simple, though. Those windows consist of two panels of plate glass—one facing the concourse interior, the other facing the outdoors. The panels are about four feet apart from each other, allowing for narrow catwalks to traverse them at each floor level of the Terminal building.  

Even more kick-ass than this: The catwalks themselves are made of huge slabs of frosted glass, allowing the outdoor light to pass through them and thereby making them nearly invisible from the vantage of the concourse floor. This is why, when you saw someone passing along one of the catwalks, he appeared to be walking on air. 

According to my GCT blueprints (public information, by the way), the four rectangular window bays on either side of the concourse rise 60 feet above the level of the balcony doorways. At the top, the cornice entablature interrupts them (that’s the fancy, gilded-plaster band on which spotlights alternate with scrolled brackets) and then 20 more feet of window glass caps the bays in the form of corresponding window arches that gradually curve outward into the concave shape of the ceiling.  

There are eight catwalks in total—six in the rectangular bays, two in the arches. (And while there are five glassed bays, there are six arches atop them, as the southernmost, 6th bay—which you’ll see rising behind the ticket booths—is a brick dummy.)  

Okay, enough of the technical stuff. Why the hell are the catwalks there? 

Unknown to most people, the Terminal building actually has quite a bit of office and storage space tucked way up and behind all those beautiful stone walls. Hell knows what the MTA uses them for today—quite possibly the Late Train Planning Center—but all the space is, obviously, a premium commodity for a midtown-Manhattan building. The catwalks were part of the original 1912 plans for the Terminal, and they allowed convenient access to the breadth of the hidden office space, which freed the architects (Warren & Wetmore, with Reed & Stem) from having to mar the effect of that stunning expanse of glass windows with closed corridors or iron balconies. Aside from serving office and storage spaces, the catwalks lead to the opulent landings of hidden, internal staircases that rise inside the Terminal’s corner piers. The very top catwalk (this one contains only a few windows that rise no higher than your knees) leads around to the base of a tiny run of steps that rise to the iron walkway suspended over the barrel vault ceiling. In the old days, the maintenance guys would use this walkway to replace—from behind—the tiny light bulbs that form the constellation painted in gold on the other side of the ceiling—which is plaster-on-lath and not much thicker than two of your fingers. (These days, those lights are LEDs, and don’t need replacing.) 

Yeah, I know. I’m dancing around the big question: How can one get up to the catwalks yourself? Legally, of course, you can’t. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t up inside both of those windows. Lots of times. (In fact, I know about the barrel-vault walkway because I managed to get up there once, too.) Thing is, all that was during the proverbial “pre-9/11” days—that blessed, unfathomably innocent period when we train geeks had little to fear from the authorities. I only got caught once, but the cop bought my line (I guess he ignored the fact that I was also wholly fortified with martinis I’d just knocked into my gullet at the Oyster Bar) and he let me go. 

These days, I’m pretty confident that they WON’T let you go if they catch you. Remember, too that—duh—if you do get up there, it’s damn well hard to keep a low profile when you’re walking around inside of a window overlooking the largest public room in New York City. I can also say (from experience) that just because you think you’re getting away with being up there does NOT mean someone’s not watching you and will be waiting for you once you slip out of the elevator on your hasty way out. 

Elevator, in fact, is about as close as I want to come to saying how it’s possible to get up into the window catwalks. Okay, somewhere between Tracks 21 and 23—but that’s ALL I’m gonna say. There are also some stairs by the Campbell Apartment—but that’s IT, okay? No more hints.  

But, listen Sherlock–chances are either a half-soused investment banker or an alarmingly sober cop is going to spot you before the little adventure even gets off the ground. I don’t go up there anymore myself—and not only because I don’t want to go to jail, but also because I don’t think it’s right to distract the cops when they could be doing more serious stuff like, oh, catching terrorists.  

So my advice is: Keep that shoe leather on the nice Tennessee marble floor of the concourse where it belongs. The Terminal’s got plenty of other cool secrets you can check out without trespassing, and I’ll write about them soon. 

—E.B.

Q: Engine Bob, a couple of years ago I got into an argument with a New Haven Line conductor over something stupid. I had missed my morning southbound Harlem Line train at Fordham Road. A New Haven train pulled in a few minutes later. It stopped, and I got on. As we were pulling away, the conductor recognized a new passenger (me) and started yelling that his train was for discharging passengers only. He didn’t care that I had a monthly commutation pass for Fordham, either. I don’t get this. If I’ve paid Metro North to travel a certain distance, what the hell difference does it make if I get on a red train or a blue one?

Since the New Haven could never have afforded to build a terminal in Manhattan—much less obtain a right-of-way onto the island—it brokered a deal that allowed New Haven trains to use the Central’s 16 miles of track into Grand Central Terminal. Operating costs would be split between the two railroads based on a percentage calculated from the number of train cars that the New Haven brought into Manhattan.

With this arrangement in place, the New Haven laid an 11-mile spur from its mainline to hook up to the Central’s. Today, the junction point is easy to spot—it’s just north of the Woodlawn Station where there’s a “flyover” that loops the New Haven tracks down into the Harlem Division’s iron over some square-arched tunnels. (It’ll make sense when you see it, trust me.)

Okay, so, the Central was happy because the New Haven would now be subsidizing its operating costs by paying rent for track usage. Emphasis on usage. The Central might let New Haven trains roll on its tracks, but it would be damned if it was going to let the New Haven generate actual revenue from New York Central customers who’d be boarding trains at the handful of stations between Woodlawn and Grand Central.

And so the New Haven, while free to discharge its own passengers at stations such as Williams Bridge and Fordham, was prohibited from boarding passengers there. If you were a passenger traveling between two points in New York Central territory, your money was going to stay with the New York Central. (Listen, the robber barons did not get rich by accident.)

To this day, that rule—or a surviving incarnation of it—is still observed, only now the players are the New Haven Division and the Harlem Division, both of Metro North. And that’s the rub, isn’t it? The rule made sense back when you had two competing private railroads—but the New Haven and the New York Central railroads have been gone for about 36 years now and Metro North runs everything.

So why is this dumb rule still in place?

I won’t pretend to know the deepest bureaucratic vagaries that must apply, here, but the essence of it is that, even though the red (New Haven) and blue (Harlem and Hudson) trains are all operated by Metro North, one train is not necessarily interchangeable with another. New Haven trains are partially funded by tax revenues from the State of Connecticut, just like Harlem and Hudson trains operate with help from New York State money. And so the accounting books must still be kept separately to some degree. Just like in the old days, Connecticut trains ain’t allowed to make money with New York State passengers.

If you’re bound for Stamford and boarding at Fordham, well, that’s fine—because your destination is in Connecticut. But if you’re going from, say, Botanical Garden to 125^th Street, you have to board a Harlem Line train.

I’m confident that I’m ignorant of a good 80% of the hairsplitting technicalities that purport to make this rule sensible in the eyes of MTA management—and the gods be praised for that—but what I’ve told you is the way it was long ago explained to me by an old-timer. This guy, incidentally, used to love to argue with New Haven conductors about the boarding prohibition, and would grandly denounce the 1848 law (which the gape-mouthed ticket-takers had probably never heard of once in their entire stinking lives) Perry Mason style.

I’m quite sure his ass still got kicked off the New Haven train, all the same. 

Q: Engine Bob, is there any truth to that old story about a secret train platform beneath the Waldorf-Astoria hotel that Andy Warhol gave a party on? Or is this just urban legend?

A: Actually, the story’s true-a good portion of it, anyway. You’re referring to what Grand Central maintenance crew (and Metro North brass, though I doubt they’d tell you much about it) knows as “Track 61.” Now, of course, if you’ve ever paid any attention to Grand Central’s numbered gates, you know that there is no Track 61. But that’s part of the idea: The secret platform was never meant-yesterday or today-to be found my members of the general public. But if you want a sense of where it is, say you were to stand on Track 24 (with your back facing the concourse) and look northward; the secret platform would lie dead ahead of you, up below 50th Street. Track 61 is technically part of the Terminal’s hidden lay-up yards that stretch between Lexington and Park Avenues, running from 48th to 50th Streets.

The story of Track 61 requires a bit of background. The tracks approaching Grand Central ran at ground level until July of 1903, when the New York Central Railroad commenced the incomprehensible project of lowering everything underground and, eventually, constructing all of lower Park Avenue on top of it. The project took ten years and ended, in 1913, with the opening of a new Grand Central Terminal (that’s the one we have today, which happens to be the third to occupy the spot.) Most all of the buildings occupying property between Lexington Avenue to the east and Madison Avenue to the west; and stretching between 42nd Street on the south and 50th Street on the north-are literally built on stilts. Tracks thread themselves around steel pilings that hold up the buildings, all of which paid the railroad for “air rights”-meaning, they paid for the right to float above the Central’s trackage, holding no deed for actual earth. (Damn, the things lawyers can come up with.)

One of the buildings built in the New York Central’s “air” was the Waldorf-Astoria hotel, which began rising above the tracks in 1929. Recognizing the strategic importance of its location, the hotel had a short, cement platform installed astride one of the tracks that passed through its basement. This became Track 61, an exclusive platform for the Waldorf’s use. From the start, it was intended as a way for dignitaries (who, in those days, always arrived by train and most often rode aboard a private railroad car) to get in and out of the hotel discreetly, avoiding the flashbulbs of press photographers. An elevator rose from Track 61 up into the core of the Waldorf itself.

Among the first to use Track 61 was General John J. Pershing, who visited the city in 1938. But the secret platform’s most famous (and probably most grateful) patron was FDR. While members of the press corps were aware that the President was paralyzed, it followed an unwritten (and amazingly, never breached) agreement not to mention the fact in print, nor use photographs of FDR using his leg braces or his wheelchair. Nevertheless, discretion had its merits and, for security reasons alone, a private and secure means in and out of Manhattan made plenty of sense for a wartime president. Arriving in the private Presidential railroad car-often arriving from his boyhood home in Hyde Park, just up the Hudson Line-FDR and his entourage would pull up to Track 61, alight, and take the elevator straight up to the hotel’s Presidential Suite. It must have been something to see.

With the passing of years and the coming of air travel, the need for Track 61 diminished (FDR was, however, the first President to use a private plane for executive travel, though the name “Air Force One” would not arrive until, I believe, the Kennedy Administration.) Ironically, the “secret” platform would next be used for two very public events. In 1946, the New York Central Railroad showed off its new 6,000-h.p. diesel locomotive in a PR event it called its “Debut at the Waldorf,” pulling the new engine up to Track 61 for a photo op. And then-yes, finally-there was the Andy Warhol party. That was in 1965 and, in classic Warhol style, the party was themed and named: The Underground Party. Fitting, if nothing else.

And there, the record of the secret platform pretty much ends. Many stories and much mystique have arisen since then, including the tale that the Waldorf kept a freight car down there stocked with surplus china (this was actually confirmed by a friend of mine who worked for the Waldorf for many years, though I never pressed for more details.)

The quest for Track 61 has also become a holy grail for many urban explorers (a successful visit is described in the book “New York Underground,” by Julia Solis.) But, post-9/11 security concerns being what they are, even these fearless souls seem to have realized that a glimpse of a dark old platform served by a rusty elevator is not worth the handcuffs that invariably come with being apprehended in the act.

But if you’d like a risk-free way to get close to the secret platform-and you’ve got some time to kill before catching your train and are profoundly bored-check this out: If you make your way up Park Avenue to the Waldorf-Astoria, walk beneath the awning to the corner of 50th (you’ll be facing St. Bart’s), make a right, then take three steps and look on your right. You’ll be standing before a set of heavy silver doors marked with a red plastic sign that reads, in effect, Metro North emergency exit. On this spot, you’re standing directly over Track 61. Behind those silver doors are stairs that lead down to the fabled secret platform-or, at least, that’s what my track map of Grand Central Terminal shows. And if you happen to see Pershing, Roosevelt, or Warhol emerging from those doors, do please write me.

-E.B.