Picayune, MS - New Station

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J

JeffConn

Train Attendant
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Nov 11, 2008
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Location
Norfolk, VA
*** NOTE THAT THE FIRST MANY POSTS WERE POSTED IN 2008 ***

On October 16, Picayune had a ribbon cutting on their brand new "intermodal transportation center", named Picayune Station. The old open-air station was pretty much just a picnic shelter. The Crescent stops daily there, and the city is requesting service from Greyhound. They also have plans to add a small railroad museum, and perhaps an airline ticket booking agency inside the station. FWIW, i don't think that Pearl River County has local bus service, so you still need a car or cab to get to the train station.

9191294_BG1.jpg


WLOX article and picture of the new station:

http://www.wlox.com/Global/story.asp?S=9191294

Some pics of the old picnic shelter:

http://www.trainweb.org/usarail/picayune.htm
 
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And yet Atlanta still has our elevated Amshack! Congrats to Picayune of course, I just hate Atlanta's station right now :p
 
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Looks great-we can add Picayune to the list of refurbed stations along with Slidell, Hattiesburg and the million dollar castle in Meridian (actually about 5 million I'm told.) Ironic part of this is Picayune is a flag stop! But then again so is Slidell (for whatever reason I'll never know because there are times that between 30 to 40 people board or de-train there; I've never seen a day where no one gets on or off.)
 
Awesome! So many new stations on the Crescent route. Greensboro comes to mind. I agree with the Slidell comment...it's a big stop in my opinion when I go down that way.

Time for Amtrak to redo the Atlanta station. Since it's convenient, make the station at Doraville, which then provides a huge boom to MARTA which can get you just about anywhere in the city you need to go. Overcrowding, terrible luggage handling (not as in rough, but just REALLY slow!), almost no parking, etc. I don't think you can do that much in the current spot unless you extend out over the tracks a lot, but I think a new location is needed.
 
Picayune is hyped about the station. They're asking Amtrak to put in a Quik-Trak kiosk, and are already thinking about adding a welcome center, in addition to a railroad museum. And like i said before, they are petitioning Greyhound to restore service to the city. They see this new station as a huge plus to Picayune. It's a small city that is thinking big.
 
Now this is funny Picayune is a flag stop and has always been a flag stop on the Amtrak version of the Crescent, yet Picayune is willing to invest in a station for train that about 70% of the time blows by at full track speed. Now why can't Atlanta, Birmingham and the other cities that have heavier used stations invest in their stations especially when they are in such horrible condition.
 
I saw this station for the first time yesterday. It's looks very nice. As some others have mentioned, it's amusing how small town America can take pride in something like this and put the money to work where several larger cities around the Amtrak system just seem to be happy with the status quo.
 
Actually Atlanta's station did get a modest little make-over in 1996, in time for the Olympics. And that little garden to the left as you walk down the steps to the train was upgraded as a tribute to Jack Martin, a big NARP and GARP mover and shaker.

I realize the station is so SMALL.....so very SMALL.

Of course it was never meant as or built for being a major station. It was absolutely nothing but a suburban station......just a pause out in the area which was probably farmland when first built.It is said the station is built because some of Atl's wealthier citizens live not too far away, an area called "Buckhead".

Anyway, Atlanta did have two big downtown stations at one time As things turned out, the last two trains in town happened to use the Southern Railroad's mainline to Washington and New York, so by tearing down the stations downtown there still was a "station"of sorts in that little building which is called "Brookwood Station"by locals. It was called "Peachtree Street Station" in the old Southern Railroad timetables.

Is anybody still reading? If so, hang on, I am about to note something I have never bothered to note before....the above I have mentioned many times.

Here it is: there was a widespread local misunderstanding that the rich pullman passengers boarded at that suburban station and the ordinary coach folks had to board downtown.

There was kind of a logical reason for this misunderstanding. The train which was originally called the Crescent (i.e. today's Crescent is more like the former Southerner)was orginally all pullman between NYC and ATL.(later Charlotte to Atlanta). Coaches were added, southbound,at the downtown station to NOL. Thus, on that train you had to board coaches downtown, whereas all boarding the the suburban station were pullman folks. Pullman folks, in fact, could board at either station. All this is pre-Amtrak, needless to say.

Thus was born the misunderstanding that the rich folks thought that little station was all for them. Not realizing coach passengers did not board the Crescent at that station simply because it did not have coaches, not because the neighborhood was so exclusive.

They had that misunderstanding notwithstanding that all other trains on that route had both coaches and pullmans at both stations.
 
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Bill Haithcoat said:
Actually Atlanta's station did get a modest little make-over in 1996, in time for the Olympics. And that little garden to the left as you walk down the steps to the train was upgraded as a tribute to Jack Martin, a big NARP and GARP mover and shaker.
I realize the station is so SMALL.....so very SMALL.

Of course it was never meant as or built for being a major station. It was absolutely nothing but a suburban station......just a pause out in the area which was probably farmland when first built.It is said the station is built because some of Atl's wealthier citizens live not too far away, an area called "Buckhead".

Anyway, Atlanta did have two big downtown stations at one time As things turned out, the last two trains in town happened to use the Southern Railroad's mainline to Washington and New York, so by tearing down the stations downtown there still was a "station"of sorts in that little building which is called "Brookwood Station"by locals. It was called "Peachtree Street Station" in the old Southern Railroad timetables.

Is anybody still reading? If so, hang on, I am about to note something I have never bothered to note before....the above I have mentioned many times.

Here it is: there was a widespread local misunderstanding that the rich pullman passengers boarded at that suburban station and the ordinary coach folks had to board downtown.

There was kind of a logical reason for this misunderstanding. The train which was originally called the Crescent (i.e. today's Crescent is more like the former Southerner)was orginally all pullman between NYC and ATL.(later Charlotte to Atlanta). Coaches were added, southbound,at the downtown station to NOL. Thus, on that train you had to board coaches downtown, whereas all boarding the the suburban station were pullman folks. Pullman folks, in fact, could board at either station. All this is pre-Amtrak, needless to say.

Thus was born the misunderstanding that the rich folks thought that little station was all for them. Not realizing coach passengers did not board the Crescent at that station simply because it did not have coaches, not because the neighborhood was so exclusive.

They had that misunderstanding notwithstanding that all other trains on that route had both coaches and pullmans at both stations.
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Nice piece of history Bill. Jack was one heck of a guy but his "garden" goes so unrecognized by the masses that pass through the cramped building.
 
I like the Atlanta station. I like it a great deal and I appreciate Bill's knowledge of the Brookwood Station past and present. It is a classic Southern Railway Passenger Station.

The primary issue is that this station was never intended to be THE passenger train station for all of Atlanta. The station is overcrowded. The elevator for baggage and mobility restricted passengers is molasses slow. There is not enough parking.

I, for one, believe that these problems can be fixed. Why not add an expanded waiting room to the rear of the existing building? One that is three times the size of the current waiting room. From the rear of this expanded waiting room add a parking garage three or four levels tall extending the length of the existing platform. Give the existing structure a full makeover...... maybe add a small cafe/coffee shop with outdoor 'sidewalk' seating in that long-unused (for parking anyway) asphalt area in front of the original station.

Oh yes...... escalators and a new elevator to platform level.

There is so much that could be done to make Brookwood serviceable again but any effort to do that has been deferred by all of the off and on talk about a new Atlanta station in a new location.

Short of a new station or complete makeover at Brookwood, I think it would make sense to establish one or two new suburban stations on the outskirts of Atlanta to take some of the strain off Brookwood Station. Perhaps a suburban station with direct access to the Marta rail system.

This idea has helped tremendously in North Carolina where the NCDOT took some of the strain off the overcrowded downtown Raleigh station by substantially increasing the size (and adding ticket agents and checked luggage) to the Cary, NC station.
 
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