140 Feet Below Midtown Manhattan, Grand Central Gets an Elevator
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When the MTA opened its new Long Island Railroad terminus beneath Grand Central Station, it needed a way to move equipment and materials between street level and the service level below. Gillespie was engaged to design a sidewalk elevator for the project, a process that had been in development since 2009 before installation finally began in late 2022. The specifications were formidable: a platform over 8 by 16 feet, a 20,000-pound capacity, and Class C2 loading requirements that pushed structural loads to nearly 62,000 pounds during loading and unloading. The elevator travels 53 feet between its two stops. But the defining challenge was the deck door. Rated for AASHTO H-25 truck loading, meaning a 40,000-pound live axle load, the vertically lifting door weighed 14,500 pounds, making it the largest of its kind Gillespie had ever built.
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Gillespie engineered a hydraulic elevator driven by a 75-horsepower power unit and a single in-ground cylinder with a piston weighing nearly 6,800 pounds. The deck door was designed as a single-piece vertically lifting panel, structurally stronger than a hinged alternative. As the elevator rises, six car-frame stanchions engage the door, set it onto heavy-duty springs, and carry it more than 13 feet above grade. On descent, the door is lowered into a gutter frame that channels water to a sump pump below before the lift continues to the lower landing. Powered bi-parting freight doors and slide-down car gates serve the pass-through lower landing. Gillespie led design and manufacturing in Ware, Massachusetts, with Schindler Elevator as installer and a team of specialized suppliers and fabricators.
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A one-of-a-kind sidewalk elevator, 13 years in the making, now handles the essential work of keeping one of New York City's newest transit hubs running, built to last for decades in one of the world's most demanding urban environments.
Gillespie engineer John Linsley documented this project in a feature article published in Elevator World magazine. To read the full article, click here.
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