Grand Central Terminal, New York City

The Ceiling Is Wrong, and That Is the Best Thing About It

The star map on the ceiling of Grand Central Terminal’s Main Concourse is painted backwards. The constellations are shown as they would appear from outside the celestial sphere, looking down at the heavens from God’s point of view rather than from the Earth looking up. This was not a mistake by the 1912 painters; it followed an illuminated manuscript that depicted the zodiac from above, and the reversal was not noticed for decades after the terminal opened. When someone finally pointed it out, the terminal’s PR department adopted a line that the ceiling was correct and it was the rest of the astronomical community that had the orientation wrong. Whether that explanation satisfied anyone is not recorded.

The ceiling itself, restored in 1998, depicts 2,500 stars picked out in gold leaf against a cerulean blue ground, with the major constellations outlined in a lighter wash. A single patch near the Cancer constellation in the northwest corner was deliberately left uncleaned during the 1998 restoration to show visitors how dark with soot and nicotine the entire ceiling was before the work began. Pointing it out to whoever you are with is a reliable way to look like you know the building.

Grand Central Terminal opened in 1913, replacing an earlier station on the same site. It covers 48 acres of Midtown Manhattan across multiple underground levels, contains 44 platforms and 67 tracks (more than any other station in the world), and handles around 750,000 people on a busy weekday. The renovation of the dining concourse completed in October 2025 has brought 83 of its 92 storefronts to full occupancy, and the food and retail offer is the best it has been in the building’s history.

Secrets Worth Finding

The Whispering Gallery is the vaulted space outside the entrance to the Oyster Bar, on the lower level. Stand in one corner and whisper at a 45-degree angle into the wall, and the sound travels around the curve of the vault to emerge clearly at the diagonally opposite corner, around 15 metres away. The effect was not designed; it is a product of Rafael Guastavino’s laminated tile vaulting system, which he used for acoustics in other buildings as well. The tiles are laid in a herringbone interlocking pattern that also makes the vaults extraordinarily strong. Testing the whispering gallery by whispering something embarrassing to your companion is essentially obligatory.

Track 61 is a secret platform in the lower depths of the terminal, accessed by a private elevator that surfaces in the Waldorf Astoria hotel a block away. President Franklin D. Roosevelt used this route regularly during the Second World War, arriving by train and transferring directly to the hotel to avoid the crowds above and to conceal both his motorcade and his disability from public view. The track has not been used for presidential arrivals since Eisenhower but still exists. It is not accessible to the public.

M42, ten stories below the main hall, is a basement space so classified during the Second World War that guards had standing orders to shoot intruders on sight. It housed nine rotary converters that transformed the alternating current from the city grid into the direct current that powered the terminal’s electric trains. The existence of M42 was not publicly acknowledged until the 1980s. It is still operational.

The Campbell Apartment is a bar on the southwest balcony level, accessed from the street on Vanderbilt Avenue. The space was originally the private office of John W. Campbell, a financier who leased it from the terminal in 1923 and had it fitted out with a pipe organ, a fireplace, tapestries, and a butler named Stackhouse. After Campbell’s death it was converted to offices, then a police holding room, then a baggage storage area, before being restored and reopened as a bar in the 1990s. The mahogany and painted ceiling are largely original. It is a genuinely atmospheric place for a drink before a train or an evening in Midtown.

The Vanderbilt Tennis Club operates hidden tennis courts on the second floor of the terminal’s Annex building, off 47th Street. The courts occupy a space that once served as an art gallery and later a television studio. They are bookable by non-members as well as members, and most people passing through Grand Central have no idea they are there.

Eating and Drinking

The Grand Central Oyster Bar, on the lower level near the Whispering Gallery, has been in continuous operation since the terminal opened in 1913. The room under Guastavino’s vaulted tiles was designed specifically for this restaurant, and the combination of the setting and the food makes it the best argument for eating inside a train station anywhere in New York. The menu runs to up to 30 varieties of oysters daily, with main courses averaging around $25. The lobster roll runs close to $30 and is widely considered worth it. Happy hour in the Lounge and Saloon runs Monday to Wednesday from 4:30 to 7 PM and Saturday from 1 to 5 PM, with discounted oysters and wine by the glass from $12.

The Grand Central Market on the Lexington Passage level is a collection of food stalls and specialty food retailers including artisan cheese, fresh pasta, and prepared foods. It is a practical option for a quick lunch or provisions for a train journey. The market operates on roughly the same hours as the terminal.

Michael Jordan’s The Steak House NYC, overlooking the Main Concourse from the balcony level, is the theatrical choice: the view down into the concourse below while having dinner in a formal American steakhouse is a particular New York experience. Reservations are needed in the evening.

For a faster meal, Shake Shack on the lower dining concourse is exactly what it always is, which is sufficient.

Getting There and Getting Around

Grand Central is on the 4, 5, and 6 subway lines (Lexington Avenue local and express) and the 7 line (Flushing) at 42nd Street, making it one of the most accessible spots in Manhattan. Metro-North commuter trains to Westchester, the Hudson Valley, and Connecticut depart from the upper-level platforms. The Long Island Rail Road now also connects at a new lower concourse beneath Grand Central completed in 2023, which links directly to Penn Station and significantly expands the network accessible from the building.

The terminal is open daily from around 5:15 AM to around 2:00 AM. Access is free. There is no admission charge and no ticket required to walk through.

Tours

The Municipal Art Society of New York runs 90-minute architectural walking tours of the terminal covering the history, architecture, and hidden spaces in detail. Tours run on weekday lunchtimes and cost around $30 per person. The terminal also produces an official tour product called “Walks” through grandcentralterminal.com. Both options are worthwhile; the MAS tour tends to be more architectural in focus.

Hotels Nearby

The Waldorf Astoria on Park Avenue is the most historically connected to the terminal, sharing the Track 61 history and being a five-minute walk. The hotel closed for a major renovation in 2017 and reopened with significantly higher rates; rooms now start at around $700 per night. The Grand Hyatt New York, directly attached to the terminal building on 42nd Street, is a more practical choice for commuter travellers and typically runs $250 to $400 per night depending on season. The Library Hotel on 41st Street is smaller, quieter, and has a rooftop bar with a view over the midtown skyline that is generally underrated in the context of New York rooftop bars.

What Not to Skip

Most people walk through Grand Central without looking up. The single most important thing to do is stand at the top of the ramp from Vanderbilt Avenue, look at the main concourse, and then look up at the ceiling. The geometry of the room, the south-facing windows, the four-faced opal clock at the information booth (which is worth around $10 to $20 million according to most estimates), and the scale of the circulation below all combine in a way that photographs do not capture. The terminal is used by hundreds of thousands of people as a functional transit building and is simultaneously one of the great rooms of the 20th century. Stand still for a few minutes and both things are true at once.