Owned by WMATA | Tracks 4 (2 per level) | |
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Location 630 H Street, NW
Washington, DC 20001 Line(s) Red Line
Green Line
Yellow Line Platforms 2 side platforms (upper level)
1 island platform (lower level) Connections Metrobus: 42, 70, 74, 79, 80, P6, X2, X9 | ||
Gallery Place is a Washington Metro station in Washington, D.C., on the Green, Red and Yellow Lines. It is a transfer station between the Red Line on the upper level and the Green/Yellow Lines on the lower level.
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Location
Gallery Place is located in Northwest Washington, with entrances at 7th and F, 7th and H, and 9th and G Streets. The station's only street elevator is north of F Street on the west side of 7th Street.
The station, which is beneath the Verizon Center, serves that arena and the surrounding Chinatown and Penn Quarter neighborhoods in downtown Washington. The station is located very close to Metro Center, such that the lights of one are visible down the tunnel from the other.
Notable places nearby
History
Service began on December 15, 1976, as part of the original Red Line that ran from Farragut North to Rhode Island Avenue–Brentwood. The opening of the station was delayed by a court order over lack of handicapped access (it was originally supposed to open with the rest of the first stations on March 27, 1976). WMATA provided assurance that such access would be available by June 1, 1977.
Yellow Line service began on April 30, 1983, adding service to the Pentagon and National Airport. An abstract wall sculpture, The Yellow Line by Constance Fleures, was installed in 1989 on the lower level platform, Green Line service began in 1991, adding service (at the time) to U Street and Anacostia.
Originally named "Gallery Place" after the nearby National Portrait Gallery and Smithsonian American Art Museum, "Chinatown" was added to the station name in 1986 (although the station's signage was not replaced until 1990). In 2000, a sculpture entitled The Glory of the Chinese Descendants by Foon Sham, was installed over the 7th and H Street entrance at the mezzanine level. The sculpture depicts a large Chinese-style fan above a bowl of rice. The station reverted to its original name, "Gallery Place", on November 3, 2011, with "Chinatown" listed as a subtitle.
This station has been a testing ground for new features in Metro stations. In 1993, the station was one of the first Metro stations to receive tactile edging on its platforms. Since 2004, the station has been the site of testing for new signage. As a result, there is far more signage in this station than most others, including lighted signs, as well as signage that isn't found anywhere else in the system. In 2007, red LEDs were tested for the platform edge lights on the upper level. Orange LEDs were tested at the platform edge on the lower level, before being replaced by red LEDs in 2008.
Station layout
Like other downtown transfer stations, Gallery Place has a two-level configuration. However, unlike Metro Center and L'Enfant Plaza, where the platforms cross centrally, the Green and Yellow Line platforms are located near the east end of the station, resulting in an off-balance layout. This is a result of the Green and Yellow Lines' location below 7th Street NW, while the Red Line must bend towards the southeast in order to reach Judiciary Square and Union Station.
Plans to add a pedestrian tunnel connecting Gallery Place with Metro Center have long been in the works. The "Gallery Place/Chinatown - Metro Center Pedestrian Passageway Tunnel Study" was completed in July 2005.