Jon Searles' photos with the keyword: cleveland

In the U.S., few other buildings than rail stations (except for some post offices, government buildings, and churches) were built to quite the same spectacular standards. This amazing fog-enshrouded tower is Cleveland Union Terminal, or Tower City as it's now known, originally built in 1930 for the New York Central Railroad. Wow... When I first saw it, I was astonished to know that it still existed, as I had only seen it in old photos, and American cities and landlords have an unpleasant habit of destroying their most beautiful buildings in favor of strip malls and parking lots. Not this one, though. C.U.T. is so huge, at 216 meters (708 feet) in height (not to mention its unusually large footprint for even such a tall building), that when it was built it was the second tallest building in the world, and the tallest building outside of New York City until 1967. This is my most "clever" shot of C.U.T., taken from the concourse, through the glass roof, which illustrates the sheer scale of the place. A number of major world rail stations have glass ceilings, glass trainsheds, and the like, although I'm not going to try and guess how high this one is. What's most impressive is that, high as it is, you can see the main office tower soaring above and behind it.

Admittedly the detail isn't baroque, but C.U.T. does represent Art Deco and Neo-Classical sort of combined into one in a very beautiful way, at least in my opinion. Of course, if you've seen the frescoes inside the building, then maybe you'd beg to differ with my opinion about it not matching baroque buildings.

It should come as no surprise to anyone that my favourite series of architectural shots I ever took in the United States were taken of a railroad station. Not only am I a railfan, but in the U.S., few other buildings except for post offices and government buildings were built to quite the same spectacular standards, with the exception, perhaps, of some university buildings and churches. This amazing fog-enshrouded tower is Cleveland Union Terminal, or Tower City as it's now known, originally built in 1930 for the New York Central Railroad. Wow... When I first saw it, I was astonished to know that it still existed, as I had only seen it in old photos, and as everyone knows, the U.S. has an unpleasant habit of destroying its most beautiful buildings in favor of strip malls and parking lots. Not this one, though.

C.U.T. is so huge, at 216 meters (708 feet) in height (not to mention its unusually large footprint for even such a tall building), that when it was built it was the second tallest building in the world, and the tallest building outside of New York City until 1967. This would undoubtably also make it the tallest railroad station in the world, as I'm absolutely positive that no other station in the world could even come close. It's so tall that from the street it's impossible to see the top, especially on a foggy day like this one, and the sensation of looking straight up absolutely blows away the view of York Minster that I have elsewhere on this site. If you ever want to see the most amazingly, eye-wateringly spectacular railroad station in the United States, this one would definitely have a lot to recommend it over New York's Grand Central Terminal or Washington's Union Station. I've seen both of them, and although I would rank Washington Union very highly too, it's far more common in its design, even if it's still huge. GCT is surprisingly mundane in comparison with either Washington or C.U.T., and holds its ranking as "world's biggest railroad station" only because of its extensive system of underground tunnels. Aboveground, it doesn't even come remotely close to C.U.T. in any respect whatsoever, at least in my opinion. :-)

The William G. Mather was a Great Lakes bulk freighter from the 1920s-1970s, and is now a museum. I visited it during the same National Railway Historical Society trip as when I photographed Cleveland Union Terminal. I guess the trip organizers realised that, while trains are trains, railfans often like steamships too.

I originally had it noted down that I took this in Cleveland Union Terminal, but I was suspicious that this was incorrect, and indeed Simplyjake has informed me that really it's a shopping mall, the first of its kind in the U.S. See his comments below for more info.