111 Eighth Avenue
111 Eighth Avenue, also known as the Google Building and formerly known as Union Inland Terminal #1 and the Port Authority Building, is an Art Deco multi-use building in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. Fifteen stories tall and occupying an entire city block, it has of floor space, more than the Empire State Building.
The Port of New York Authority began acquiring the land on the building's site in 1930, against the protests of local residents. It was completed in 1932 and served as an inland terminal for the Hudson River piers and as a warehousing and industrial facility. Occupancy fell to 50percent in the 1970s due to the decline of industrial activity in Manhattan, and the Port Authority itself moved to the World Trade Center in 1973. In the 1990s the building began to attract tenants in the technology and telecommunications sectors. In 2010, the building was purchased for $1.8 billion by Google, who became its largest tenant; Google's presence helped attract other technology companies to Chelsea and contributed to the neighborhood's ongoing gentrification. Aside from Google, the building is also home to a cancer treatment center and a black box theater.
Description
111 Eighth Avenue occupies the full city block between Eighth and Ninth Avenues and 15th and 16th Streets in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. The building, completed in 1932, was designed by Lusby Simpson of Abbott, Merkt & Co. The building is 15 stories tall and has of floor space, more than the Empire State Building; the individual floors are nearly in area and have ceilings. It has a rooftop helipad and penthouse floors on either end of the building.Its exterior is in the Art Deco style and features recurring seagull motifs. The walls are largely made of brick, with granite bases; the first two stories are limestone, and copings and finials are of terracotta. Because of the warehouse mission of the building, it was able to avoid some of the setback rules that greatly reduced the buildable space available for the skyscrapers that mark the Manhattan skyline.
Features
Original use
The building had a multipurpose design when it opened in 1932, with the first floor and basement designated as "Union Inland Terminal #1", which was to be used to transport goods by truck to and from railroad lines and shipping piers on the Hudson River. Cargo was dropped off along 15th Street, sorted inside the building, and picked up from the 16th Street side. The building included four truck elevators, each of which had a capacity and could travel at up to. These elevators measured across, and they lifted trucks into pits measuring deep and across. There were also 12 package elevators and 18 passenger elevators. Freight companies used the elevators to deliver cargo directly to tenants, in contrast to other industrial buildings in New York City, where cargo was dropped off at ground level.The second floor contained Commerce Hall, designed for exhibitions. The upper floors were intended for manufacturing. Each floor covered. There were 16 loading docks on each floor. On the 15th floor, which contained the Port Authority's offices, engineer Aymar Embury II designed a 325-seat auditorium decorated in green and blue. The New York Herald Tribune said was the "first auditorium designed for commercial purposes in a strictly commercial structure".
Current use
The building's design retains vestiges of its original industrial purpose, including truck-sized freight elevators and floors built to support heavy loads., two of its original truck elevators were still in use, in addition to nine other large freight elevators and fourteen passenger elevators. The floors of the two lobbies originally each had a large bronze seal of the Port Authority embedded in them; one of these was removed and converted into a coffee table as a retirement gift for Port Authority director Austin J. Tobin. It is also noted for its unobstructed views of the Manhattan skyline. The building has direct access to the 14th Street/Eighth Avenue station of the New York City Subway; when the building opened, a staircase at 15th Street and Eighth Avenue led directly to the subway station in the basement.History
Union Inland Terminal #1 and Port Authority Commerce Building
By the early twentieth century, the West Side of Manhattan was plagued with heavy traffic because of the tangle of street-level passenger and freight trains on the West Side Line, cargo unloading from the busy Hudson River piers, and the lack of suitable warehouse facilities. The situation led the Port of New York Authority to commission the construction of a large inland terminal at 111 Eighth Avenue. It was designed to alleviate the traffic problem by streamlining the distribution of goods within a single location. Instead of cargo being picked up directly at the piers, it would be brought to the building to be consolidated, where trucks could pick up all their cargo in a single stop. A concurrent project, the West Side Improvement Project, replaced the West Side Line with the original High Line elevated railway, which ran a few blocks away from 111 Eighth Avenue; it began full operation in 1934.Construction
In May 1930, the Port Authority and all of the railroads in the Port of New York agreed to build a "union inland freight terminal" between Eighth Avenue, 15th Street, Ninth Avenue, and 16th Street. The terminal was planned to cost $15 million and would include office space, as well as large driveways and about for sorting freight. The structure was to be known as Inland Terminal No. 1 because the Port Authority hoped that similar freight terminals would be constructed across the city. At the time of the announcement, the Port Authority already owned half of the block, which it had acquired for $1.5 million. Most of the block had been occupied by houses, except for a factory in the middle of the block on 15th Street. The New York City Board of Estimate approved the proposed terminal's site in June 1930. The Port Authority acquired additional land on the building's site throughout the rest of the year, despite the protests of local residents. By October 1930, the Port Authority had bought 85 percent of the site and was preparing to acquire the remaining buildings through condemnation.A contract for the demolition of existing structures was awarded in December 1930. Twelve railroads signed an agreement with the Port Authority to use the new terminal at the beginning of January 1931, and contractors immediately began razing the site. The Godwin Construction Company was contracted in April 1931 to excavate the site and construct the building's foundations. A groundbreaking ceremony for the freight terminal, attended by New York State governor Franklin D. Roosevelt, took place on April 30, 1931. That September, the Port Authority received bids for the construction of the building's superstructure; the Turner Construction Company submitted a low bid of $7.591 million. Construction required 120,000 cubic yards of concrete, 65 miles of piping, and 12 million bricks, as well as 160,000 barrels of cement. The Port Authority also paid to widen the streets on all four sides.
Four hundred railroad managers were invited to inspect the new terminal on September 9, 1932. Inland Terminal No. 1 was formally dedicated the next week, September 16, though the building was not at that time fully completed. At the time it was the largest building in New York City. The building ultimately cost $16 million; the superstructure alone cost $8 million to $9 million. Shippers and consignees began using a freight terminal on the basement and first floor on October 3, 1932. Only the basement and ground story were open at the time; the upper stories, intended for light manufacturing, were not expected to be completed until the end of the year. Real-estate experts cited Inland Terminal No. 1 as one of several developments that were contributing to the growth of businesses in Chelsea. The final dedication of the building occurred on February 25, 1933, with a ceremony attended by Port Authority, New York City, and New York state officials. A banquet was held in one of the building's truck elevators to mark its dedication.
Opening and early years
Tenants had begun moving into the upper stories even before the building's dedication. By the beginning of 1933, eight hundred shipping firms were using the terminal to ship outbound freight, while fifty shippers received inbound freight there. Upon the building's opening, the Port Authority leased the terminal to the New York Central Railroad, the Pennsylvania Railroad, the Lehigh Valley Railroad, the Erie Railroad, the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, the Lackawanna Railroad, the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad, and the Central Railroad of New Jersey. Each railroad paid the Port Authority ten cents for every of freight handled at the terminal. The terminal was to be used by all shippers in Manhattan between Houston Street to the south and 23rd Street to the north. At the time of construction it was estimated to be capable of handling one-third of the 680,000 annual tons of less-than-carload freight at the port. Among the terminal's tenants during the 1930s were the Woolworth Company, Rand McNally, the New York Trust Company, and offices of the Works Progress Administration.The Port Authority hired Caldwell, Garvan & Bettini in October 1933 to construct a lobby, stair, and foyer for Commerce Hall on the building's second floor. Commerce Hall opened on December 8, 1933, with an exhibit of Ford Motor Company vehicles. The terminal saw early success in reducing truck traffic to and from the railheads. For instance, on May 25, 1936, 250 trucks brought cargo to the building that was consolidated into only 37 trucks to take to the ferry terminals. Commerce Hall hosted the National Business Show for several years in the 1930s. By February 1938, all of the building's space had been rented, despite the ongoing Great Depression. After Commerce Hall was closed in 1938, the floor was converted to regular commercial use.