Subway?

[SonicBoi]

Was this a Subway sandwhich shop or does subway have a different meaning (e.g. underground walkway). This is on the parking garage at 11th and McGee (I think that's about right)

[carfreekc]

I've always wondered what that was, too. It's been like that as long as I can remember (and I think vacant that long too).

[kcteen]

me too. Can someone clue us in?

KcTeen

[FangKC]

I've also wondered about that place. Having lived in New York City, it reminds me of subway entrances in many of the older buildings there.

I don't think it was ever part of the Subway restaurant chain because it appears to pre-date that chain. Perhaps it was just a subway sandwich place that used that name before the chain developed.

We need to ask an older person who has lived in KC for many years.

That is a cool old parking garage though. I wish the owner would renovate it and bring it back to its former glory. There is a lot of neat art deco terra cotta stonework on that building. Since there is such a need for parking downtown, you would think it would behoove the owner to renovate and reopen it. If it was cleaned up, sandblasted, regrouted, and the windows replaced, it wouldn't be a bad-looking structure.

Cleaned up, it would certainly be a much better-looking than that ugly concrete garage across from it on 11th Street. If there ever was a building that needed to be torn-down, it's that hideous monstrosity on the north side of 11th and McGee.

The parking garage shown in the photo posted above is mentioned in a book called "Popular Art Deco: Depression Era Style," which lists it among some of KC's art deco "treasures." There are few parking garages in America that ever had such decorative elements in their design.

It is also on the National Register of Historic Buildings.

[bahua]

Well, I'm no franchise sandwich expert, but I don't think the sandwiches were ever called "subway sandwiches," until the Subway chain came along. I'm fairly certain that people just called them hoagies or submarine sandwiches.

[SonicBoi]

I'm wondering if it was an underground walkway to somewhere. In Detroit there are some tunnels called subways that were walkways. The only question with this theory is where did it go?

[carfreekc]

With the address or block, we could look in the old city directories in the Missouri Valley room at the downtown library. (Oh, to have those online...!!) If it was a business, it would be in there.

Hmmm....this is from a Pitch article last year about the garage:

http://www.pitch.com/issues/2002-09-19/ ... index.html

Construction crews labored on the sixteen floors of the Professional Building and would eventually link that building to the National Garage by tunnel.

I wonder if it could be for that tunnel?

If anyone else can go sooner...I won't be able to get to library until later this week at the earliest to have a look. (It's so easy to spend a long time in the Missouri Valley room!)

[FangKC]

I did a little research at the downtown public library today. I looked in the Cole's Directories and old SW Bell Directories over a span of years (from the 1940s-80s) for any business called Subway at that address. I found none.

I'm inclined to think it was a subterranean tunnel that lead to the Professional Building, or to the buildings that existed on the north side of 11th St. before the Parkade Garage was constructed there.

Again, I think the best way to find out is for someone to ask an older person who worked in downtown for many years. Someone in their 70s or 80s. Anyone have grandparents they can ask?

[SonicBoi]

Urban exploration any one? (um, kidding of course)