Hanging Out at the Union

  The Chicago Union Station is one of the largest and busiest train stations in the country.  On a daily basis approximately, 120,000 travelers and visitors pass through the doors of this ten city block station.

The present station opened in 1925, replacing an earlier union station on this site built in 1881. One of the attractions of this huge station besides the Amtrak train lines and the Metra commuter lines movements at the station, is the Great Hall with its 219-foot-long barrel-vaulted skylight that soars 115 feet above the ground. Many a photographs and movies have been created within this beautiful hall.

While I have been one of the "few" who has spent time taking pictures of this elaborate hall in the past, on this particular day I decided to just hang around and take photos of the activities and people who traversed the Great Hall.

What follows are photos taken with my Z7 and the 24-120 mm lens.

One of the largest groups of people to utilize the Union Station are the Amish people. A reason so many Amish pass through the West Loop station is because their communities are concentrated in the Northeast and the Midwest, the heartland of Amtrak service. Thus, Amtrak has become their railway, and Chicago is its hub. 

  Another reason is the Amish people objected to automobiles when they came out in the early 20th century because they involved individual ownership. And most rejected air travel because it was so modern and so fast.

 "As long as someone else is driving, in this case Amtrak......it's OK!"

I did become facinated by this family of seven. They all kept a vigilant eye in the direction of the Clinton street entrace. I never figured out why, though.

 

And so another day was spent at the Chicago Union Station, people watching.