Apple has allegedly begun work on its upcoming retail store in Grand Central Station and the world-renowned terminal in New York City’s Manhattan area serves 700,000 commuters daily. There had been concern among preservationists that the retail store, a throwback to the highly commercial period at Grand Central Terminal and the new store will open on November 12th……………..
Construction is now underway at New York’s Grand Central Terminal, where Apple is hard at work on a new retail store that may open this year. Apple‘s new retail outlet will encompass two adjacent balconies for a massive 23,000 square-foot location. The ongoing construction can be seen in new photos taken from the ground floor of the terminal by AppleInsider reader Mike DeFrancesco. The project is expected to take about four months to complete and the company reportedly hopes to have its Grand Central store open to the public before this holiday shopping season. The project went through an on-and-off phase, where at one point it appeared the effort was abandoned entirely. But Apple eventually reached a deal with the MTA and paid the previous tenant, Charlie Palmer’s Metrazur restaurant, $5 million to move out of the east balcony eight years early. Apple is also said to be paying a premium for renting the area, somewhere between $800,000 and $1.1 million per year. That’s well more than the $263,997 that was paid by Metrazur. The massive store will be roughly 3,000 square feet larger than the company’s existing flagships. Given the crowds that already utilize the terminal, Apple is said to be working with police to figure out how to handle lines during product releases, so that people are not waiting in the concourse. Apple is said to have submitted its formal bid to the MTA in linen-lined boxes, as if it were a wedding present to transit officials. While the Grand Central store is being built, Apple is also hard at work in updating another New York City store in its flagship location on Fifth Avenue. Apple is currently replacing the glass cube that serves as the entrance to the underground location, simplifying it by cutting the number of panes from 90 to just 15.
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