In 1904, the first line of the New York City subway system
opened, built by the Interborough Rapid Transit (IRT) Company.
The line’s southernmost terminus was City Hall Station, an
architectural showpiece intended to attract riders to the new
subway. Three amethyst-glass skylights admitted sunshine from
the street above. Brass chandeliers and artworks added to the
appeal of the platform. And the vaulted ceiling was spectacular.
Designed and installed by a Spanish immigrant named Rafael
Guastavino, it included a series of repeating arches along the
tightly curving track decorated with colored tiles set in
geometric patterns resembling inlaid wood. City Hall Station,
later called an “underground cathedral” and the “Mona Lisa of
subway stations,” ranked twelfth on Travel + Leisure magazine’s
2009 list of the world’s most beautiful subway stations. Yet
today, City Hall is a ghost station that the public has not seen
for nearly seventy years. (Members of the New York Transit
Museum can tour it on occasion.) As yea