Captiol Hill Subways

[jis]

Some of us managed to ride at least two of the three subway lines that connect various buildings on Capitol Hill during the NARP Day on the Hill.

There are three separate lines:

1. Capitol to Rayburn Office Building (House Side)

2. Capitol to Russell Office Building (old Senate Side)

3. Capitol to Dirksen/Hart Office Buildings (new Senate Side) (LIM drive)

Of these 3 is not open for the use of anyone other than Senators and Staff. The other two can be used by those on official visit after registering for such and getting badge, to get from one building to the other.

We managed to ride 1 and 2. Both of them are somewhat challenging to find within the labyrinth of Basements and Sub Basements of the buildings, and then within the Capitol Building it is an interesting exercise to get from the House side subway to the Senate side subway, again through byzantine corridors in the basement. It is almost impossible to do this unless you have an official visitor badge, which you can get either at the House or Senate buildings stations of the subway, within some unpredictable constraints, or are personally escorted by staff. So you never know whether you will get the necessary badge until you actually are given one and then pass through the Capitol Police checkpost. But once you manage to jump through the hoops it is an interesting short ride in the open cars that are powered by 3 phase low voltage AC collected from overhead for the two old lines. The new line uses a track mounted LIM drive. The LIM cars themselves are unpowered so need not collect any electricity. They are automatically operated sort of like a horizontal elevator,unlike the older lines which are operated by human operators on the cars.

You can see this article for some more details.

 

[fairviewroad]

I rode at least one of those during a high school trip there in the early 90's. Definitely ranks high on the novelty scale, but ranks low on the "thrill" scale (i.e. it's

about as wild as an amusement park kiddie ride). At least, that was my impression as a teenager.

 

[tp49]

I rode all of the Senate ones and the House side subways while interning in DC back in the 90's. The Hart subway was the only one that wasn't open air and looked like something you'd see at Disney World. Sad to hear that access is now severely limited as back then anyone could get on them.

 

[Bob Dylan]

The post 9-11 Security Theater Flimflam has made me nostalgic for ancient times as a Senate Page and DOL Employee who used to ride the Senate subway ( there was only one Senate Office Building then!) often.

I have fond memories of riding on them with many Senate Lions such as LBJ, Dirksen,HumphreyYarbrough,Russell,Thurmond, the Kennedys,Goldwater, Gene McCarthy, Byrd etc)There were Giants in the Senate then, now there's Pygmies!!! Sigh

And you could roam the halls of the Old Senate Office Building, ride the manned elevators etc with no security hassles !There were guards @ the entrances but they usually were asleep in the afternoons! LOL.

It really started changing in '68 when they shot Bobby, MLK etc. but the assisination atrempts on Ford, Raegan etc. expedited it, and of course 9-11 was the nail in the coffin for the peoples easy access to their Government!

We walked to/from the House Office Buildings and the Capitol. Senators were the closest thing to Royalty we had in those days and the Senate Dinning Room was THE place for Lunch!!!

( I still can taste the famous Navy Bean Soup!

Those were the Golden days in Washington, we won't see their likes again!!

 

[jis]

Oh yeah, one time we also did walk from the Cannon House Office Building to the Capitol through the connecting tunnel. BTW, there is also a walkway along the subway from Rayburn Office Building to the Capitol should you feel particularly like walking across instead of riding the subway. And of course on the House side Cannon, Longworth and Rayburn are interconnected by underground walkways, and on the Senate side, Russell, Dirksen and Hart are likewise connected by underground walkways. We did use al of those walkways at some time or the other during the day.

And yes, the Navy Bean Soup .....