Railroad Forums 

  • SEPTA and Amtrak plan to reconnect their train stations (pedestrian) at 30th Street

  • Discussion relating to Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (Philadelphia Metro Area). Official web site can be found here: www.septa.com. Also including discussion related to the PATCO Speedline rapid transit operated by Delaware River Port Authority. Official web site can be found here: http://www.ridepatco.org/.
Discussion relating to Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (Philadelphia Metro Area). Official web site can be found here: www.septa.com. Also including discussion related to the PATCO Speedline rapid transit operated by Delaware River Port Authority. Official web site can be found here: http://www.ridepatco.org/.

Moderator: AlexC

 #1627494  by Jeff Smith
 
The below-ground connection used to exist, and it’s coming back thanks to a huge, federally funded renovation: BIllyPenn.com
30th Street Station is a major hub for train travel in Philadelphia region, but if you try to get there via the city’s most-used transit line, the transfer is anything but simple.

That should change in the near future, as SEPTA and Amtrak have identified plans to restore a connecting tunnel as a part of a federally funded renovation.

As things stand now, the Market-Frankford Line stops at 30th Street, but you can’t get to the Amtrak hub without going above ground, following a route that lacks wayfinding signage and traverses a street that funnels automobile traffic off the I-76 highway.
...
 #1627538  by MACTRAXX
 
JS - (RW and Everyone:)
I remember the connecting passageway between the SW corner of 30th Street Station and the Market Street
Subway (Market-Frankford Line and Sub-Surface Trolley Lines 10, 11, 13, 34 and 36) that was closed and sealed
in the early 1980s. There were staircases and escalators down to a segment of hallway that was under some of
the lower level tracks requiring a long descent from the 30th Street main hall level and then up into the 30th
Street subway station east end fareline area. The article mentions the physical problems that this passageway
had - but did NOT mention the prime reasons for the closure which were:

1 - There was a jurisdictional problem between the Amtrak and Philadelphia Police Transit Unit (before SEPTA
PD was created in the early 1980s) about which agency would patrol the passageway...
2 - The passageways had some crime problems: vandalism (graffiti, etc.); vagrancy and most importantly the
design of the passageway itself - in particular the bottom of the escalator and staircase from the Amtrak level
led to problems such as assaults and/or robberies being reported. There were some riders that knew about
the bad reputation that this connecting passageway had and refused to use it before its closure...

What I would like to see is the layout and rendering of how this new undergrade connection is going to be -
Being able to construct a new passageway without having to tunnel deep down below Amtrak track level
as the original one had should be key here...MACTRAXX
 #1628070  by BlueRiband
 
Temple's archives has a diagram of the original pedestrian connection here:
https://digital.library.temple.edu/digi ... 77/rec/160
Interesting in that there was once a direct connection between each of the lower platforms and the then-PTC concourse.
If memory serves, the original stairway opening in the Amtrak station was near the west office elevators. When the passageway was first closed is was boarded over. But when the station underwent restoration in the 1980s that stairway was renovated out of existence. The construction of the rental car garage probably severed the connection.
I'd like to see a scheme on how a restored connection would be done too. They would have to avoid all of the problems that caused the old passageway to be closed. Do they take space from the rental car garage? It's pretty small and tight as is.