After much pestering by reporters and silence from Apple, the MTA finally released the official presentation to its board concerning the upcoming Grand Central Terminal Apple Store. The presentation — available here as a PDF — contains three high-res renderings of the proposed store, and as the above shot shows, it appears as though Apple and the MTA have figured out how to incorporate the store into the iconic and landmarked terminal without overwhelming it.
This rendering shows how the Apple Store will take over the currently unoccupied northeast balcony as well as the former Metrazur space. It appears as though the elevators from the lower level will open directly into the store itself, and I have to believe that security measures will be in place there as well. The total amount of space Apple is taking out comes to 23,000 square feet which includes the entire east and northeast balcony spaces. Apple is currently working on building out the store, and it should be open before the end of the year.
As I look at these renderings, one thought comes to mind: As integrated as the store will be with the Grand Central space, the images have very few people in them. The Apple Store, simply put, will be far more crowded than these illustrations show. As long as the computer giant and the MTA are prepared for the influx of people, this will be a very, very successful retail space indeed.
9 comments
I just want their furniture…
they forgot the throngs of tourists
i’m really an fearful of the massive crowds this will cause..
A glimpse of the future, maybe?
For instance, 30th Street Station in Philadelphia–another large, historic, busy train station–has an old disused waiting room off to the side. Retail in there would also seem like a good idea.
I wonder if the Grand Central Apple Store is a new wave of retail heading to transportation nodes…
Steve – by “disused” (30th St. Station) do you mean “underused” or is it closed? I believe I sat in that waiting room during my alternate-plan travels home from Florida in the days following 9/11.
Other than major product release days and the immediate days to follow, I would think Grand Central will be big enough to handle the crowds going to the store. On the highest-traffic days, the MTA and Apple will probably have to figure out line logistics, to keep people waiting from blocking commuters getting off the trains and heading out to 42nd Street, Lexington Avenue or to the subway.
Now just let Apple design software to guide all dispatchers, drivers, and trains. We’re living in some sort of 1890’s time-warp were some really bored humans get paid a lot of money to care less about how they work than often they have to work.
Humans are horribly inefficient at running dozens of moving trains with specific destinations. We’ve all seen how effective traffic cops are when a stoplight isn’t working.
Automated trains with truly roaming on-board subway MTA attendants will be the best day NYC will enjoy.
We already have CBTC by Siemens (it works fine everywhere else, so any problems here on the L are on the MTA), and the latest ERTMS level for automated commuter and high-speed rail operation if Amtrak/FRA would allow it. These systems are all ready, regardless of the fact that our railway agencies don’t use them.
I wish the MTA or any other relevant body had any plans to ERTMS-ify commuter rail. So far the MTA seems to be asking the FRA for waivers, claiming that the current LIRR and Metro-North signaling systems are good enough to be classified as PTC.
Politics aside, there is one huge obstacle to getting PTC/ETMS working in the New York area, and that is the availability (or lack thereof) of radio spectrum.
Elsewhere in the country, where single-track low-use freight lines meander through the rural countryside, it’s not difficult to put up a radio tower and find clean frequencies on which to transmit rail signal aspects and other directions to trains. But in the highly congested NY area, where the complex switching interlockings west of Penn Station converge 20-some tracks into a single tube, or near the Sunnyside Yards/Harold Interlocking – I think the busiest in the world – which carries NJ Transit and Amtrak as well as LIRR (and is well within radio range of Metro-North’s New Haven Line), it is a huge challenge. We’ve seen what heavy data usage does to the cellular systems, now apply that to trains which require a higher reliability rate and at a frequency that can travel (and interfere) for miles.
Add the fact that you’ve got multiple agencies working independently and looking out only for themselves, despite the fact that radios signals don’t observe arbitrary territorial boundaries, and there’s not enough for each agency to get their own slice of spectrum for their private use.
And one more thing on the incumbent owners of this spectrum. Now that the FRA has passed this PTC initiative, he’s realized the pot of gold he’s sitting on, and he’s going to ask a price that could buy him a nice-sized Mediterranean island.