Anonymous
Post 08/29/2025 07:44     Subject: Trump admin takes over Union Station

There is a lovely chocolate shop that gives out free samples. I work nearby and stroll by more often then I should. It is busy with people. I do not feel unsafe during the work day.
Anonymous
Post 08/29/2025 07:37     Subject: Trump admin takes over Union Station

Anonymous wrote:I've seen a lot of promiscuous women there at night coming and going.


Well stop trying to solicit them and go home to sleep. Sleep deprivation is bad.
Anonymous
Post 08/29/2025 07:32     Subject: Trump admin takes over Union Station

Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Good.

Union Station is a filthy, God awful dump. It is unsafe. It is a national embarrassment that our nation's capital train station looks like a filthy open sewer.

Clean that garbage heap up, get rid of all of the junkies, and make it safe to ride again.


I'm there daily and it's fine. Not dangerous, not "an open sewer."
Is it a shopping center with good retail options? No. It's a transit hub. It has fast food and gift shops for the people killing an hour between trains.



Clearly you've never been anywhere nice in your life. The station is dumpsville USA. Why do Americans have expectations that are in the gutter. Train stations across the world are transit hubs where people may be for an hour or less, so? Go see how much better they are than dumpy Union Station.


So TBC, you support massive government spending on public transportation?

Or is this about making the station a pretty (and expensive) shopping center while the actual rail line continues to be both slower and more expensive than flying, and Musk torpedoes high speed rail projects? Because the point of Tokyo's nice station is its nice high speed trains that thousands of people use every day.


How about we start by getting rid of the vagrants? That’s low cost.


"Getting rid of" ... by providing heath care and/or residential treatment? That's pretty expensive. Presumably you mean by shoving them a block away and then declaring mission accomplished.
Meanwhile the station still won't attract more people or shops because, again, the point of the place is transportation and we don't invest in any.
Anonymous
Post 08/29/2025 06:03     Subject: Trump admin takes over Union Station

Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Good.

Union Station is a filthy, God awful dump. It is unsafe. It is a national embarrassment that our nation's capital train station looks like a filthy open sewer.

Clean that garbage heap up, get rid of all of the junkies, and make it safe to ride again.


I'm there daily and it's fine. Not dangerous, not "an open sewer."
Is it a shopping center with good retail options? No. It's a transit hub. It has fast food and gift shops for the people killing an hour between trains.



Clearly you've never been anywhere nice in your life. The station is dumpsville USA. Why do Americans have expectations that are in the gutter. Train stations across the world are transit hubs where people may be for an hour or less, so? Go see how much better they are than dumpy Union Station.


So TBC, you support massive government spending on public transportation?

Or is this about making the station a pretty (and expensive) shopping center while the actual rail line continues to be both slower and more expensive than flying, and Musk torpedoes high speed rail projects? Because the point of Tokyo's nice station is its nice high speed trains that thousands of people use every day.


The station would be nicer if they wouldn’t have ever let dozens of people camp on Columbus Circle out front and wonder around shouting obscenities at passerbys and leaning out in public. The tents have been addressed just prior to Trump coming in because of the outrage over the encampments there but the damage was already done. Union Station wasn’t always the ire of right wing talk show hosts. It wasn’t always this way.

Now, because of a lack of will to police simple quality of life issues, they’ve removed most of the seating in the station because everyone must suffer now because the cops can’t tell people to move it who sleep on the chairs all day. It’s an adequate parable for American society.


Lol, ironically, right-wing hosts are there all the time because Fox is right across the street. I’ve seen Brett Baier in his cowboy boots and show makeup on the regular. 😂
Anonymous
Post 08/29/2025 00:22     Subject: Trump admin takes over Union Station

Anonymous wrote:My issue with union station is that it's really hard to get to (we're in a close by VA suburb). We just take the bus to NYC. It's faster and easier.


Union Station has its own Metro stop, is near bus lines, and has connections for MARC trains and VRE trains in addition to being the Amtrak station and bus station. For most people in the area it really is quite easy to get to.



Anonymous
Post 08/28/2025 16:49     Subject: Trump admin takes over Union Station

I've seen a lot of promiscuous women there at night coming and going.
Anonymous
Post 08/28/2025 11:48     Subject: Re:Trump admin takes over Union Station

Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:It had really fallen apart. I remember when they did a big renovation back in the late 80s'/early 90s. There were so many shops and great places to eat. We'd go as a family (I was a kid at the time) just to have dinner there.

We took our kids there a few months ago since we had an Amtrak to NYC. So many vacant storefronts, and not much on offer at all. The place has really declined. I don't know who to blame, but whatever they had been trying to do to fix it wasn't working.


Yup. 1000%.

It's funny, because we just got back from Japan. Tokyo Station is absolutely mind warping. So many gourmet places to eat. Everything is immaculately clean. Insanely safe. You would go out of your way just to go to the train station to spend money. Everything is on time.

Union Station is probably 100 tiers lower than Tokyo Station. You're tell me the mighty USA with the world's #1 economy and sole remaining super power cannot do better than that sorry dump we have for a capital train station known as Union Station? There is absolutely zero excuse why we can't have a Tokyo Station.


Tokyo Station has something like 6x the passenger count per day. Plus Tokyo Station is nearby to Ginza, one of the most popular shopping districts in the world, and on the other side, one of the most consequential business districts in the world. What the hell does Union Station have to compete with any of that? You can't have a Tokyo Station in Washington DC no matter how much you want it.



All I hear are excuses. It doesnt have to be Tokyo Station, the point is that it should be nice *like Tokyo Station*. Actually, your stats show how pathetic we are. The fact that Japan can have their capital station serve 6x the number of people per day and not have it look like a trash dump shows you how crappy we've become.

If the US is #1, then why are our standards so low and borderline third world? It should be EASIER to have a nice train station that is clean and safe *because* we only have to serve 6x fewer number of people that Japan does in its capital city main train station.

Clean up Union Station. It is a trash hole and a disgrace. It's so sad to see so many abandoned shops and urban decay in our country's capital city main station.


Well you see republicans hate mass transportation. So they have defunded for over 40 years. This is why the US infrastructure is so pathetic. It is republicans’ fault.

Now Trump and idiots like you think the US military will improve it. What the f are you thinking?


True, but it's not only their fault. The vagrancy and crime problem is largely the fault of the feckless Dems/Progressives as the local level. Add that to the chronic underinvestment in public transportation largely driven by the short-sighted Republicans, and you have the clusterf*ck we see today.


How is vagrancy and crime ON FEDERAL PROPERTY the fault of local government?
Anonymous
Post 08/28/2025 11:47     Subject: Re:Trump admin takes over Union Station

Anonymous wrote:To be perfectly honest, the station had dramatically been improved since Amtrak took control a year ago. But it was really, really bad from 2021 to early 2024.


Actually in my memory, things started to go visibly downhill (also in Eastern Market) around 2019 pre-Covid with a flood of opioids and the synthetic drugs. That’s when you started to see people tweaking out everywhere, on the ground, etc b
Anonymous
Post 08/28/2025 11:45     Subject: Trump admin takes over Union Station

Does this mean we are not going to get the new high speed train Amtrak had announced? I was really looking forward to that.
Anonymous
Post 08/28/2025 11:44     Subject: Trump admin takes over Union Station

Anonymous wrote:Based on reports from other cities, this isn't about beautifying Union Station, but rather seizing control of the nation's rail system.


This country is so screwed.
Anonymous
Post 08/28/2025 11:43     Subject: Trump admin takes over Union Station

Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Good.

Union Station is a filthy, God awful dump. It is unsafe. It is a national embarrassment that our nation's capital train station looks like a filthy open sewer.

Clean that garbage heap up, get rid of all of the junkies, and make it safe to ride again.


I'm there daily and it's fine. Not dangerous, not "an open sewer."
Is it a shopping center with good retail options? No. It's a transit hub. It has fast food and gift shops for the people killing an hour between trains.


I agree. I am there daily. I bought a dozen bagels for the office today.. Commuters and travelers doing their thing. I am surprised more shops have not reopened. Plenty of people there. Not a single thing is boarded up.


Agree - it’s fine. I have heard the reason there are not more shops is because of the new plans being developed not because “crime.”
Anonymous
Post 08/28/2025 11:42     Subject: Trump admin takes over Union Station

Anonymous wrote:Good.

Union Station is a filthy, God awful dump. It is unsafe. It is a national embarrassment that our nation's capital train station looks like a filthy open sewer.

Clean that garbage heap up, get rid of all of the junkies, and make it safe to ride again.


No, it isn't. You clearly have never been there.
Anonymous
Post 08/28/2025 11:41     Subject: Trump admin takes over Union Station

Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Good.

Union Station is a filthy, God awful dump. It is unsafe. It is a national embarrassment that our nation's capital train station looks like a filthy open sewer.

Clean that garbage heap up, get rid of all of the junkies, and make it safe to ride again.


I'm there daily and it's fine. Not dangerous, not "an open sewer."
Is it a shopping center with good retail options? No. It's a transit hub. It has fast food and gift shops for the people killing an hour between trains.



Clearly you've never been anywhere nice in your life. The station is dumpsville USA. Why do Americans have expectations that are in the gutter. Train stations across the world are transit hubs where people may be for an hour or less, so? Go see how much better they are than dumpy Union Station.


So TBC, you support massive government spending on public transportation?

Or is this about making the station a pretty (and expensive) shopping center while the actual rail line continues to be both slower and more expensive than flying, and Musk torpedoes high speed rail projects? Because the point of Tokyo's nice station is its nice high speed trains that thousands of people use every day.


The station would be nicer if they wouldn’t have ever let dozens of people camp on Columbus Circle out front and wonder around shouting obscenities at passerbys and leaning out in public. The tents have been addressed just prior to Trump coming in because of the outrage over the encampments there but the damage was already done. Union Station wasn’t always the ire of right wing talk show hosts. It wasn’t always this way.

Now, because of a lack of will to police simple quality of life issues, they’ve removed most of the seating in the station because everyone must suffer now because the cops can’t tell people to move it who sleep on the chairs all day. It’s an adequate parable for American society.


I have no idea what you are ranting about. Biden/Bowser got rid of the encampments. Yes they should do better with moving the disruptive vagrants along … but guess what - this is federal property and the Feds chose not to! Ask yourself why the Feds have long permitted and CONTINUE to permit people to congregate in front of the Postal Museum … that is not the jurisdiction of MPD or the Amtrak police.
Anonymous
Post 08/28/2025 11:27     Subject: Re:Trump admin takes over Union Station

Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:It had really fallen apart. I remember when they did a big renovation back in the late 80s'/early 90s. There were so many shops and great places to eat. We'd go as a family (I was a kid at the time) just to have dinner there.

We took our kids there a few months ago since we had an Amtrak to NYC. So many vacant storefronts, and not much on offer at all. The place has really declined. I don't know who to blame, but whatever they had been trying to do to fix it wasn't working.


Yup. 1000%.

It's funny, because we just got back from Japan. Tokyo Station is absolutely mind warping. So many gourmet places to eat. Everything is immaculately clean. Insanely safe. You would go out of your way just to go to the train station to spend money. Everything is on time.

Union Station is probably 100 tiers lower than Tokyo Station. You're tell me the mighty USA with the world's #1 economy and sole remaining super power cannot do better than that sorry dump we have for a capital train station known as Union Station? There is absolutely zero excuse why we can't have a Tokyo Station.


Tokyo Station has something like 6x the passenger count per day. Plus Tokyo Station is nearby to Ginza, one of the most popular shopping districts in the world, and on the other side, one of the most consequential business districts in the world. What the hell does Union Station have to compete with any of that? You can't have a Tokyo Station in Washington DC no matter how much you want it.



All I hear are excuses. It doesnt have to be Tokyo Station, the point is that it should be nice *like Tokyo Station*. Actually, your stats show how pathetic we are. The fact that Japan can have their capital station serve 6x the number of people per day and not have it look like a trash dump shows you how crappy we've become.

If the US is #1, then why are our standards so low and borderline third world? It should be EASIER to have a nice train station that is clean and safe *because* we only have to serve 6x fewer number of people that Japan does in its capital city main train station.

Clean up Union Station. It is a trash hole and a disgrace. It's so sad to see so many abandoned shops and urban decay in our country's capital city main station.


Well you see republicans hate mass transportation. So they have defunded for over 40 years. This is why the US infrastructure is so pathetic. It is republicans’ fault.

Now Trump and idiots like you think the US military will improve it. What the f are you thinking?


True, but it's not only their fault. The vagrancy and crime problem is largely the fault of the feckless Dems/Progressives as the local level. Add that to the chronic underinvestment in public transportation largely driven by the short-sighted Republicans, and you have the clusterf*ck we see today.
Anonymous
Post 08/28/2025 10:56     Subject: Trump admin takes over Union Station

Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Good.

Union Station is a filthy, God awful dump. It is unsafe. It is a national embarrassment that our nation's capital train station looks like a filthy open sewer.

Clean that garbage heap up, get rid of all of the junkies, and make it safe to ride again.


I'm there daily and it's fine. Not dangerous, not "an open sewer."
Is it a shopping center with good retail options? No. It's a transit hub. It has fast food and gift shops for the people killing an hour between trains.


I agree. I am there daily. I bought a dozen bagels for the office today.. Commuters and travelers doing their thing. I am surprised more shops have not reopened. Plenty of people there. Not a single thing is boarded up.