SUNY Administration Building

This is what we used to call the D&H Building, a gothic-style office building at the foot of State Street on Broadway. It was built in 1914 as the headquarters of the Delaware & Hudson Railroad company, and the broad plaza in front of the building was the terminus of most of Albany's streetcar lines and, later, city bus lines.

The flags depict each of the university's campuses and schools around the state. At the top of the spire is a weathervane in the shape of Henry Hudson's ship, the Half Moon.

Although I didn't take a photo of it, just to the south is the distinctive old ticket office building for the Hudson River Day Line, a passenger steamboat company that, until 1948, sailed between Albany and New York City about 150 miles to the south.

The building's 13-story central tower seen from the Corning Preserve amphitheater on the riverfront.

In 1973, the State University of New York (SUNY) purchased the building and renovated it to serve as the system's central administrative headquarters. The renovation included closing the plaza to traffic and replacing it with a grassy park. SUNY moved into the renovated building in 1978.

Part of the old Plaza, now a park, and Broadway. The southern tower's upper floors are the official residence of the SUNY chancellor. Nice digs!

I certainly have memories of The Plaza, as it was called, as a terminal for the city's bus lines. Those old rounded city buses from the 1960s were an impressive sight. I didn't know it then, but much later I would end up working for one of the larger bus and streetcar operators in the nation.