New York Central & Hudson River Railroad Power Station (Glenwood Power Plant)

The New York Central & Hudson River Railroad Power Station, also known as the Glenwood Power Plant, was built between 1904 and 1906 in Yonkers, New York, just north of New York City. The electricity that was generated here powered electric trains, which in the early 1900s began replacing steam engine locomotives. The strategic location of the plant along the Hudson River, and near existing and planned trackage, provided an essential link for travel between Manhattan and the growing suburbs. The power station was designed by the firm of Reed & Stem, who also designed Grand Central Station. It is significant not only for its industrial architectural work in the Romanesque Revival style but also the safe electric rail service it provided for the NYCHRR system. The site was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2021.

The New York Central & Hudson River Railroad (NYCHRR) was formed in 1867 from a merger of the Hudson River Railroad and the New York Central Line, both owned by Cornelius Vanderbilt (1794-1877). Vanderbilt also owned Manhattan’s 42nd Street Grand Central Depot, constructed in 1871, which was at the time the grandest rail terminal in the country.

The trains of the NYCHRR, like other trains of the day, were originally powered by steam, which made travel in dense, urban areas dangerous because of the considerable amount of smoke that steam locomotives produced. A deadly collision in Manhattan’s Park Avenue tunnel in January, 1902, which killed fifteen train passengers, resulted in the president of New York Central, William H. Newman’s, announcement one week later that all of the railroad’s lines into Grand Central would need to be electrified. This prompted the swift move to construct the Glenwood Power Plant in Yonkers, along with another power plant in Port Morris in the Bronx, in order to meet the increased demand for electric power. Two years after the Yonkers plant was completed, steam trains were completely banned from Manhattan.  

The NYCHRR Power Station was designed by the firm of Reed & Stem of St. Paul, Minnesota. The use of red bricks as the primary cladding material and the absence of elaborate ornamentation highlight the Romanesque Revival style of the power plant. There are three contributing steel frame buildings: a three-story powerhouse (1904-1906), a three-story switch house and substation building (1904-1906), and a one-story pumphouse (1928). 

The Glenwood Power Plant served the NYCHRR until 1936, when the Yonkers Electric Light & Power Company, a subsidiary of Con Edison, took it over. It was used for almost three decades to generate power for Westchester County and the surrounding areas until it was shut down in 1963, the same year Con Edison constructed the Indian Point nuclear power plant near Peekskill, NY. Although the substation remained in use by Penn Central, as the NYCHRR was known post-consolidation with the Pennsylvania Railroad in 1968, until 1988, since then the site has been essentially abandoned. As of 2021, the buildings continue to retain a high degree of integrity.

1. “New York Central & Hudson River Railroad (Glenwood Power Plant) #100006146.” National Register of Historic Places. Feb 12, 2021.
2. Hughes, C.J. "Converting a Run-Down Power Plant." New York Times, June 3, 2014.
3. “Glenwood Power Plant.” Abandoned. Accessed Sept 7, 2021. https://abandonedonline.net/location/glenwood-power-plant.
4. “Former Glenwood Power Plant.”, Knauf Shaw LLP. Accessed Sept 7, 2021. https://www.nyenvlaw.com/glenwood-power-plant/.