Reading Terminal and Trainshed

The Reading Railroad erected its new terminal in Center City in 1891-93 to challenge the larger Pennsylvania Railroad in carrying passengers. Like its competitor’s Broad Street Station, it was a “terminal,” in which departing trains had to reverse direction.

The two-part building comprises a brick and terracotta, Renaissance-style “headhouse” by New York architect Francis Kimball, which contained waiting rooms and company offices, and a steel and glass train shed by the Wilson Brothers, Philadelphia’s preeminent engineers. 260 feet wide, the train shed was largest structure of its kind in the world when it was completed—a title it reclaimed when the even larger train shed of the Broad Street Station was destroyed by fire in 1923.

After Reading trains were re-routed to the “commuter tunnel” in 1985, the headhouse and train shed were restored and adapted for use by the Pennsylvania Convention Center and the adjacent Marriott Hotel. The bustling food market in the undercroft beneath the tracks continued to operate during the conversion, and it still thrives.