Newest pre Amtrak stations?

[mp-44]

Try Manassas Va it pre-dates the Civil War

 

[John Bredin]

On the oldest basically-unchanged station question, Lemont and Lockport on the Metra Heritage Corridor line --passed but not served by Amtrak's Lincoln Service and Texas Eagle -- are the original stone depots from 1859 and 1863 respectively.

 

[cirdan]

Isn't Fort Wortth also fairly new?

 

[abcnews]

Thanks to the many responses to this thread. As far as the newest pre-Amtrak stations--it looks like it turns out to be what I kind of figured.....that is, the last new stations were built mainly by the railroads of that era that still seemed to have some pride in their passenger train operation--most notably the Seaboard Coast Line, and the Santa Fe. The Milwaukee station was shared by the mostly pro-passenger MILW, but also the questionable C&NW, although the North Western did run a fine commuter operationAnd the motivation for the Albany-Rensselaer station was to get out of the old large Albany station, in the case of the NYC/PC....

The Seaboard Coast line really had wonderful passenger service. I actually rode Amtrak about the first month they began in 1971, when SCL was still operating the Star. I was like 12 years old and the service and equipment was outstanding, even though it had just become an Amtrak train. I never travelled on SCL pre Amtrak. The trains were long with many cars, engines, 4 baggage/express cars and very nice lounge cars with large windows.

But the SCL did update their stations in the 1950s or so, such as Charleston, SC (nice), Petersburg, VA (Ettrick - nice modern depot, still in use) and their RF & P partner and step child... Ashland and Quantico, VA. The Silver Star would stop at Ashland in the SCL days.

 

[R30A]

Meriden CT might win here. It is from 1970.

 

[abcnews]

1970 would be hard to top since Amtrak was created a year later in May 1971.

Makes sense too - I think of the Penn Central/NEC cash flow from Washington - Boston passenger service. I would guess passenger revenue was still a big priority in the Northeast, even just before Amtrak took control.

 

[railiner]

Meriden CT might win here. It is from 1970.

I think you may be right.....it looks like a nice station, a little small, but probably very adequate for the market it serves.

http://www.trainweb.org/usarail/meriden.htm

Nicer than some of the 'shacks' that Amtrak built later for similar sized markets.....

It looks a lot like some Greyhound depots that were built in small cities in that era....

 

[railiner]

1970 would be hard to top since Amtrak was created a year later in May 1971.
Makes sense too - I think of the Penn Central/NEC cash flow from Washington - Boston passenger service. I would guess passenger revenue was still a big priority in the Northeast, even just before Amtrak took control.

Passenger revenue was substantial in the Northeast rail scene back then, but when you think about Penn Central treatment of their passenger's, you would never know it...

By 1970, various government agencies were already subsidizing certain passenger services (commuter), so I would hazard a guess that Meriden very likely received the benefit of such in the way of the new depot.....

 

[xyzzy]

SCL did offer good passenger service all the way to 1971, and they built a number of passenger stations after World War II. Some of those, however, were not out of the goodness of SCL's heart (or its predecessors). The 1962 Savannah station replaced a station that was torn down to make way for I-16. The 1956 Charleston station replaced one that burned in 1947.

In the end, SCL knew it would have to replace its passenger cars and passenger locomotives shortly and was not about to throw big money into passenger rail at that point. That's what drove SCL (and Southern 7 years later) into the hands of Amtrak.

 

[zephyr17]

Pretty much the same for Santa Fe, too. That and the mandate that they'd have to run everything for at least 5 more years, including the Tulsan, the La Junta-Denver connection, 23 & 24 Grand Canyon remnant, and the SF Chief. John S. Reed really did not want to join, and said that he could have just kept the trains that Amtrak kept (Super Chief/El Cap and the San Diegans) he might have been able to make a case to the board to stay out. As it was, the financial case was overwhelming. IIRC, Santa Fe only signed their contract with NRPC like 10 days before April 30, 1971.

 

[Nathanael]

There were a lot of "new stations" built by the NY Central and Penn Central when they were demolishing and selling off their old stations. Many of them are physically intact.

The thing is, most of those stations were sufficiently awful that they have been replaced by other stations -- often in better locations -- since then.

Some of the ones which "retain their architecture" barely qualified as stations. Meriden, CT is one of the *nicer* ones (it was city-funded).

As for stuff like the dreadful "East Syracuse" station in Syracuse, NY -- nobody will miss it.

Therefore I find "oldest" more interesting. Looking at Amtrak, stations on the Capitol Limited route south of Pittsburgh and north of DC are likely to be old simply because the B&O line is very old. The stations on the Cardinal in WV are also likely to be very old because the C&O line is nearly as old.

Some of the oldest surviving stations are actually suburban stations on what are now "commuter rail" lines, or even "subway lines", however -- because early passenger railroad lines were often *short*, so if you're looking for old stations, you want to look near the big cities.

Relatively few of these are architecturally intact; a lot of them were knocked out during grade separation projects, including most of the pre-1910s stations on the LIRR.

But (for example) Hudson, NY on Amtrak and Metro-North is pretty much intact and it's from 1874. A bunch of Metra's routes in Chicago were never grade-separated and have lots of really old stations. You can also find quite a lot in New Jersey.

 

[jis]

Metro North has yet to be extended to Hudson NY

BTW Metropark NJ was probably one of the very early stations to be dedicated by Amtrak. It was dedicated on Nov 11, 1971, and service started in early 1972. Iselin and Colonia were eventually taken out of service, replaced by Metropark.