Springdale station is a

commuter rail Commuter rail or suburban rail is a Passenger train, passenger rail service that primarily operates within a metropolitan area, connecting Commuting, commuters to a Central business district, central city from adjacent suburbs or commuter town ...

station on the

New Canaan Branch The New Canaan Branch is an 8.2-mile (13 km) long branch line of the Metro-North Railroad New Haven Line that begins from a junction east of downtown Stamford, Connecticut, north to New Canaan, Connecticut, New Canaan. On weekdays, many bra ...

of the

Metro-North Railroad The Metro-North Commuter Railroad Company , also branded as MTA Metro-North Railroad and commonly called simply Metro-North, is a suburban commuter rail service operated by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), a New York State publ ...

New Haven Line The New Haven Line is a commuter rail line operated by the Metro-North Railroad in the U.S. states of New York (state), New York and Connecticut. Running from New Haven, Connecticut, to New York City, the New Haven Line joins the Harlem Line ...

in Springdale,

Stamford, Connecticut Stamford () is a city in Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States, outside of New York City. It is the sixth-most populous city in New England. Stamford is also the largest city in the Western Connecticut Planning Region, Connecticut, Weste ...

. The station opened in 1868, and was rebuilt in 1972.

History

The Springdale station began as a stop on the New Canaan Railroad, which was chartered May 1866 as a short branch of the

New York and New Haven Railroad The New York and New Haven Railroad (NY&NH) was a railroad connecting New York City to New Haven, Connecticut, along the shore of Long Island Sound. It opened in 1849, and in 1872 it merged with the Hartford & New Haven Railroad to form the New ...

. The line opened on July 4, 1868. As with the rest of the New Haven Railroad, the station was acquired by Penn Central Railroad in 1969. The station's staffed ticket office closed on January 15, 1972. Springdale station was reconstructed south of its previous location in 1972 in order to accommodate the new M2 Cosmopolitan railcars. By 2010, after condominiums were built on nearby Camp Avenue, the station became more crowded. In April 2010, construction started on a 400-foot, $1 million canopy on the station platform. Gar-San Corporation of Watertown won the $1.87 million contract for the project. (The company was to build an identical canopy at the Stratford train station.) A large part of the expense came from having the foundation for the canopy to be drilled into the ground because of space constraints. Completion of the project was expected in December.

Station layout

The station has one four-car-long high-level

side platform A side platform (also known as a marginal platform or a single-face platform) is a platform positioned to the side of one or more railway tracks or guideways at a railway station, tram stop, or transitway. A station having dual side platforms, ...

to the west of the single track. The station has a ramp to the platforms, but it was built before the

Americans with Disabilities Act The Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 or ADA () is a civil rights law that prohibits discrimination based on disability. It affords similar protections against discrimination to Americans with disabilities as the Civil Rights Act of 1964, ...

and may not meet ADA accessibility requirements. The station is owned and operated by the

Connecticut Department of Transportation The Connecticut Department of Transportation (officially referred to as CTDOT, occasionally ConnDOT, and CDOT in rare instances) is responsible for the development and operation of highways, Rail transport, railroads, mass transit systems, por ...

(ConnDOT), with some responsibilities delegated to Metro-North. A parking lot is located at the west side of the station off Hope Street. Station parking is controlled by Stamford city government, which owns most of the parking lot.
Springdale station Web page at Metro-North Railroad Web site, accessed July 4, 2007 The state owns a much smaller parking area at the south end of the station. The parking lot has landscaping and a "period pedestal clock".
Springdale Train Station Visual Inspection Report / January 2007" prepared by the Bureau of Public Transportation of the Connecticut Department of Transportation, accessed at the Connecticut Department of Transportation Web site on July 4, 2007

References

External links

Station from Largo Road entrance from Google Maps Street View
* http://www.ct.gov/dot/lib/dot/documents/dpt/1_Station_Inspection_Summary_Report.pdf {{MNRR stations navbox Metro-North Railroad stations in Connecticut Former New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad stations Buildings and structures in Stamford, Connecticut Railroad stations in Fairfield County, Connecticut Railway stations in the United States opened in 1868