Futility Closet

A Long Wait

Posted in Oddities, Technology by Greg Ross on March 7th, 2009

In 1912, workmen digging a tunnel for New York’s new subway discovered a carpeted room with oil paintings, a fountain, and a grand piano.

It was the waiting room for an early prototype subway built in 1870 — a block-long tunnel in which a single car was pushed by a giant fan. Funding had failed, and the project had been forgotten.