If you know where to look, there are a number of abandoned stations, unusual stations, as well as intact stations that have been closed for quite awhile if you are riding a LIRR train east from the Flatbush terminal in Brooklyn. There’s the East New York station, which looks like a particularly decrepit subway stop; the abandoned Woodhaven station (hard to detect, as trains passing it in the tunnel are going over 60 MPH at that point) as well as today’s entry…
…Boland’s Landing, which can be seen just as the train emerges from the tunnel eastbound at Atlantic Avenue and 125th Street. It’s part of the large Morris Park LIRR repair facility. You can see older push and pull engines that have been retired; if the public were allowed in it would be a train buff’s dream.
The station itself is unusual. It’s only two cars in length and the platform is still composed of wooden planks. It serves LIRR employees working at the Morris Park facility and the public is not allowed to exit; you would be trespassing if you did leave the train and would be detained by security. The station actually has a printed schedule, if you wanted to get photos out the window when the train stops there. The schedule can be found at the LIRR Today Boland’s Landing page.
Further east on the line, there’s the Hillside Facility station east of Jamaica, also open only to LIRR employees. That station annoys me a little, because westbounds often have to stop there and may cause me to miss a connection at Jamaica.
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10/27/22
4 comments
I can’t remember where I read in, and Google’s no help, but Metro North has a one-door-length employee platform on the New Canaan line that serves a nearby radio repair shop.
The Locust Manor LIRR is open, but is it equally as ethereal as this?! Thanks.
The LIRR Hillside Facility, located as you noted east of Jamaica, serves the 1000-car LIRR electric fleet and is thus far larger than Morris Park, which services the much smaller diesel fleet of 45 locomotives and 134 cars. I believe that the official name is Richmond Hill shop; Morris Park was the old electric car shop that was in the area near Boland’s Landing. The electric car shop moved to Hillside in 1991.
Looking at this area on Google Maps, there’s a lot going on name-wise, it appears. I see designated areas called Richmond Hill Yard, LIRR-Morris Park Yard, Boland’s Landing, and LIRR-Dunton Station. That last one is the most mysterious to me. Can you please shed some light/drop some info on Dunton Station?