Buffalo Exchange Street Station Razed

Razing has begun of the Exchange Street Station in Buffalo, New York, to make way for a new facility.

The former New York Central depot is served by all Amtrak trains in Buffalo except the Lake Shore Limited.

Amtrak passengers have been using a temporary facility since Aug. 12. Exchange Street station opened in 1952.

Its replacement will cost $27.7 million and is expected to open in fall 2020.

Exchange Street is served by two Empire Service roundtrips between New York and Niagara Falls, and the New York-Toronto Maple Leaf.

Waving Goodbye in Elyria

The railroad station has long been a focal point of life in American cities and towns, but in many places the Amtrak station is little more than a bus-stop style shelter.

Elyria, Ohio, is one of those places. Its station is new, but offers minimal amenities.

The city and county have been talking for years about having Amtrak’s Lake Shore Limited and Capitol Limited stop at the former New York Central passenger station in Elyria, which is now used by local transit buses.

But that project is expensive and bogged down in red tape and political conflicts. Perhaps some day it will all work out.

In the meantime, the bus shelter station will have to do.

It is shown on June 26, 2019, from aboard the eastbound Lake Shore Limited, which was more than three hours late when it arrived in Elyria.

Two girls see off a friend who is boarding No. 48.

City, County at Odds Over Elyria Train Station

The city council in Elyria, Ohio, and the Lorain County Commissioners are at loggerheads over a stalled project to move the Amtrak stop in the city to a former New York Central station.

Now known as the Lorain County Transportation and Community Center, the efforts to make it an Amtrak station date back five years.

City and county officials disagree over why that effort has halted.

Mayor Holly Brinda blames county officials, saying they’ve refused to meet with city and state officials to discuss the project.

However, commissioner Matt Lundy blames Norfolk Southern, saying it has made a number of demands in return for its cooperation.

Amtrak’s Lake Shore Limited and Capitol Limited use NS tracks through Elyria. Both trains stop at an Amtrak-built shelter

“I think it is important for city council and the citizens of Elyria to understand that the city of Elyria is not the reason this project is not moving forward at this time,” Brinda said during a council meeting this week. “On the contrary, the city has gone out of its way to offer assistance, and we are still hopeful the project can be saved.”

She contended that the Lorain County commissioners also “haven’t embraced the help” the city has offered including indemnifying the county against liability.

Lundy said the county is “committed to trying to make the project work.”

However, he said NS wants an open indemnification for an endless period of time.

“That’s something we can’t do. If, God forbid, something should go wrong, then obviously the county would be open to potential litigation and liability,” he said.

Lundy said the county tried to negotiate with NS but is legally forbidden from exposing the county and taxpayers to liability.

Brinda called that false issue, saying she has spoken with the Ohio Rail Development Commission about acting as a neutral third party to assess the station plan and offer assistance.

But that can’t happen without the cooperation of the county she said.

She also said NS said two years ago it was willing to work through the liability issues.

Elyria Law Director Scott Serazin said officials in Toledo and Sandusky have found ways to address the liability issues.

Lundy, though, said the situation in Elryia differs from projects in Sandusky and Toledo.

In Elyria the project design includes a skywalk above the tracks so that passengers would have access to both tracks at the station site.

Lundy said the skywalk is a large liability issue for safety over the tracks, which will have to remain active during construction.

Serazin suggested that the Elyria Community Improvement Corporation could purchase insurance coverage to cover any liability created by the project.

The city has $250,000 available that it said could be spent on the station project while Lorain County has Federal Transit Administration funds, more than $3.6 million in grants and a $2.9 million commitment from Amtrak.

Brinda suggested taking out a “co-insurance” policy to be funded by the city and the county.

Lundy acknowledged that there have been numerous emails, phone calls and letters exchanged about the project and its legal issues. “We have had endless discussions with Amtrak and Norfolk Southern and legally, we can’t do it,” he said.

Brinda and Lundy met last year to discuss the issues but neither could recall when that meeting occurred.

Lundy also contends that Amtrak has been unwilling to make a long-term commitment to serving Elyria.

It has offered a five-year commitment but balked at the county’s request for a 25- or 30-year commitment.

“We have been at this for a long time, and it’s not something we’ve taken lightly,” Lundy said. “We looked at every angle possible. We have a responsibility to the taxpayers to not expose the county and the taxpayers to an open liability potential unless we can get the railroad to agree to limited liability . . . it’s a misrepresentation that we didn’t try to make it work.”

Cincinnati Union Terminal Set to Reopen

A restoration of Cincinnati Union Terminal will wrap up this week when the 85-year-old art deco station reopens.

The $228 million restoration project took 30 months to complete after getting underway in July 2016.

The project was funded by a sales tax approved by Cincinnati and Hamilton County voters in 2014.

Amtrak’s Cardinal stops at the station and it is home to several museums.

The restoration effort involved rebuilding the structure down to its substructure and restoring the class murals in the rotunda to look the way that they did when the depot opened in 1933.

The neon-lined clock on the front of the building also was rehabilitated.

“This is a monumental achievement for our staff and volunteers and for the entire community” said Cody Hefner, a representative of the Cincinnati Museum Center.

“Everyone who works here, and really everyone in the community, has a story about Union Terminal, either as a train station or as a museum. So to be able to restore a place with such a personal connection, and to do so in such a grand, visible, breathtaking way, is really incredible.”

Amtrak moved its waiting room to an adjacent building during the restoration. It returned to CUT during the first week of November.

During the public reopening on Nov. 17, Hefner said projectors will be used to light the terminal’s exterior with different exhibits each evening.

A large Christmas train display, a tradition at CUT since 1946, will open to the public on Nov. 16.

New Schenectady Station Opens 2 Weeks Early

The new Amtrak station in Schenectady, New York, has opened two weeks ahead of schedule.

A ribbon cutting ceremony was held on Oct. 17 for the $23 million station that is served by Amtrak’s Empire Corridor trains as well as the Lake Shore Limited, Maple Leaf, Adirondack and Ethan Allen Express.

Funding for the station included $19 million from the state of New York, $3.6 million from the Federal Railroad Administration, $220,000 from Amtrak and $48,000 from the Schnectady Metroplex Development Authority.

It is the third new station in the Empire Corridor to open in the past three years following station openings in Niagara Falls (2016) and Rochester (2017).

Ann Arbor Station Drawings Released

Drawings of the proposed new $86 million Amtrak station in Ann Arbor, Michigan, have been released.

Made by an architecture firm, the drawings show a pitched-roof train station elevated above the tracks and having an elevated walkway to East Medical Center Drive for University of Michigan hospital employees and visitors.

A five-level parking deck will be constructed on the eastern half of what’s now a city-owned parking lot along the south side of Fuller Road in Fuller Park.

The western half of the parking lot would remain surface parking.

The outer appearance of the parking deck would be a combination of brick, vertical metal panels and tempered glass, with a dedicated bus entry/exit off Fuller Road and a separate station parking entry/exit off Fuller Road, and a walk-in bus/bike station.

Ann Arbor has been discussing for several years building a new station to replace a smaller facility built by Amtrak in 1983.

The facility still needs approval of the Federal Railroad Administration and Ann Arbor voters.

Penn Station Work Moving on Schedule

Amtrak expects the renovation of New York Penn Station and its Empire Connection to be completed on time and without major surprises.

In a briefing last week, Amtrak Chief Operating Officer Scot Naparstek said rebuilding of the Empire Connection from the west end of Penn Station to the connection west of the Spuyten Duyvil Metro-North Station is on schedule.

The project involves the Empire Tunnel, the rails between the tunnel and the Spuyten Duyvil Bridge.

The Spuyten Duyvil Bridge swing span is expected to be back in place by the week of July 30, with tweaking of the electrical and mechanical systems to take place during August.

Workers are replacing 2,500 track fasteners inside the tunnel as well as lowering the track to accommodate clearances of the new Hudson River Tunnels.

A new switch is being installed at 72nd Street and workers are replacing 15 miles of welded rail and 15,000 ties.

Surfacing of 19 miles of ballasted track will be done before the Labor Day Weekend on the largely double-track line.

The Empire Connection is used by the Chicago-New York Lake Shore Limited as well as other Empire Service trains.

At Penn Station a new upper-level handbag kiosk is being installed along with a Starbucks and a wine store kiosk.

Platform 6, which serves Tracks 11 and 12, will be taken out of service for Moynihan Station work, and will be restored next year. Other platforms are getting better lighting and new signs.

New Display Site Needed for GG1 in Harrisburg

Amtrak’s plans to renovate the Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, station means that historic Pennsylvania Railroad equipment on display there must be moved.

The display includes Pennsy GG1 No. 4859 and a PRR cabin car.

The Harrisburg Chapter of the National Railway Historical Society is seeking a new home for the GG1 and cabin car, both of which it owns and displays on space it leases from Amtrak.

The GG1 is usually displayed on Track No. 5, but Amtrak plans to rebuild the platform for that track to have high-level platforms that conform with the Americans With Disabilities Act.

John Smith of the Harrisburg chapter said it is talking with Amtrak for a solution that would enable the equipment to continue to be displayed under cover.

Amtrak has offered use of another track, but that would expose the locomotive to the elements.

Another idea being considered is moving the display to a pavilion near Harris Tower and 1,000 feet north of the station.

Smith told Trains magazine that he wants to see another track built so that passengers boarding trains could see the equipment and that it would be under cover.

He said that because the GG1 is on the National Register of Historic Places that Amtrak cannot put the chapter and its equipment at a disadvantage.

CUS Addition Being Widely Panned

A proposal to add an addition atop the head house of Chicago Union Station is being widely panned.

The design has been sharply criticized in newspapers, on blogs and on social media.

The design by Chicago-based Riverside Investment & Development and Convexity Properties proposes a modernistic, seven-story steel and glass addition.

It would have 404 apartments while 330 hotel rooms would be added to the head house of the station, which was completed in 1925.

Most critics have said the designs of the original station and the addition at incongruous.

Chicago Tribune architecture critic Blair Kamin described the addition as having all of the grandeur of a Holiday Inn.

“The architects are trying to create a design that they say would be compatible with, yet distinct from the addition,” Kamin wrote. “But in this case, the addition is not compatible in the least with the existing Union Station. It’s top heavy. It is a grid, a metal and glass grid that is not compatible with the carefully composed classical design.”

In The Architect’s Newspaper, Elizabeth Blasius described the addition as a self-inked address stamper.

“The proposed addition is not only an imbalance in terms of design, it’s also condescending to the station itself, the architectural equivalent of a head patting, or worse,” Blasius wrote.

Most comments on a Facebook page run by Chicago Railroad Historians have described the design of the addition as “an abomination.” Similar comments were made by some on Twitter.

However, DePaul University transportation professor Joseph Schwieterman took a more positive view.

“Having a major hotel become the centerpiece of the design will strengthen the station’s role as a premier travel center,” he said, adding that he considers much of the criticism of the architectural details is misplaced.

“The design leverages the air rights above the head house building while still respecting the station’s historic character. This is a win-win for both travelers to and residents of the city of Chicago,” said Schwieterman, who is head of the Chaddick Institute for Metropolitan Development.

He said the plan could make Union Station’s Great Hall a tourist attraction, saying Chicago has a dismal track record when it comes to preserving historic rail terminals.

Gone are Central Station, Grand Central Station, LaSalle Street Station, and the former Chicago & North Western Terminal.

Ceiling Collapse Closes Amtrak Station

A ceiling collapse prompted Amtrak to temporarily suspend service to Rome, New York, this week.

The ceiling fell in about 3:15 p.m. on Wednesday but just one person was in the depot at the time and was not injured.

Amtrak closed the station in order to make repairs, which are expected to take until at least July 10.

Passengers are being steered to the Utica, New York station 14 miles away.

New York Central built the Rome station between 1912 and 1914 and it has been owned by the City of Rome since 1988.

The station was renovated between 2002 and 2004. Trains stopping there include the New Y York-Toronto Maple Leaf and two Empire Service round trips.