Tacoma Gem

TACOMA MINI TOUR: Now that CJ is down at University of Washington Tacoma at least one day a week, we're getting to know our neighbor city to the south better. 

The UW-Tacoma campus is right in the heart of the museum district of Tacoma. Across the street are the Tacoma Art Museum, the Washington State History Museum, and the Chihuly Glass Museum.

We actually haven't been inside any of those yet, but we have done the 'poor man's' museum tour of the district, by visiting the outdoor Chihuly glass displays, for instance. This blue glass installation on a walkway between campus and the Chihuly museum reminds me of rock candy on a stick.

And I've not twice visited a building I've driven by dozens of times over the years, but never stopped inside until recently - Tacoma's old Union Station. It's absolutely beautiful.

The U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) has a web page outlining the building's history. It notes that "Tacoma's reputation as the "City of Destiny" began when it was chosen by the Northern Pacific Company in 1873 as the western terminus of the northern route of the transcontinental railroad, then under construction." 

Naturally, the railroad station and tracks helped propel the city into a center for industrial and commercial development. Tacoma's economy and population grew (from just under 2,000 in 1873 to 37,714 in 1890, per the GSA).

The first train station was built in Tacoma in 1883, and nearly 10 years later moved to the site of the current building on Pacific Avenue in 1892. In 1906, grand designs for a new Union Station got underway. Construction commenced in 1909, and the station was open in May of 1911. The station served tens of thousands of passengers in the peak of railway ridership in the 1930s, and during World War II's boom, as well. However, after the war, train ridership began to wane as more Americans embraced the car-in-every-garage dream. The GSA reports, "The last passenger train left Union Station on June 14, 1984, and the abandoned building soon fell into disrepair."

The photo below is a look back toward the station after walking across the overpass over the railroad tracks. 

Today, the building has been remarkably repurposed. It's a free public art gallery, meeting place, and home to a Federal Courthouse.

The rotunda is breathtaking, as is the Chihuly sculpture, “End of the Day,” hanging from the center of the dome.

Out windows toward Pacific Avenue, you can see part of the UW Tacoma campus.

There, you'll find “Water Reeds,” a Chihuly creation.

Below, my parents help provide scale so you can see how b

The enormous east window is populated adorned by Chihuly's “Monarch Window.”

When Annabelle and I visited, the sun and the glass created pretty orange reflections on the mezzanine.

In the upper south mezzanine is “Lackawanna Ikebana.”

Below, Annabelle points out a favorite glass element and provides scale to give you an idea just how enormous the installation is.

There are a few relics from the past down in the 'basement' of the building. 

Artifacts include original drawings dating back to when Union Station was still on the drawing board.

If you ever have a chance to visit Tacoma's Union Station in its present form, I absolutely suggest you do so!