Train Station

The Sykesville Historic Preservation Commission decided last Tuesdayto spend its remaining money earmarked for the train station restoration on burying electrical wiring.Chairwoman Rebecca Herman said the commission will pay to have an unsightly exterior electrical cable buried underground to try to add to the attractiveness of the building.The group also is buying a plaque to be placed somewhere in the train station with a list of names of those who donated $1,000 or more to the restoration project.

The Maryland Transit Administration will put its new southbound train platform into service on Monday at the Halethorpe station, located along Southwestern Boulevard. The existing southbound platform and waiting shelters were closed after the last train departed Friday night, officials said. Starting with the first train Monday morning, April 22, all southbound boarding and detraining will take place on the new, high-level platform. The new station, located about a quarter-mile from the existing station, features handicap accessible elevator towers and a 700-foot raised platform.

For most of us, a trip to New York City means there will be rides on the Subway. Visits to Washington, D.C., are much more palatable when parking problems are traded for train rides on the Metro. Go to San Francisco or Oakland, Calif., and odds are a ride on the BART (short for Bay Area Transit) will be part of the itinerary. Chicago has its L (short for elevated). Boston has the T (short for transportation). Here in the greater Baltimore region, though, train transport is a realistic option only for commuters whose schedules are as regimented and predictable as the days of the week.

Homes, offices and shops would sprout around Baltimore's Penn Station under a preliminary plan developed for Amtrak for the midtown site. The national passenger railroad tapped Beatty Development, the Baltimore-based developer responsible for Harbor East and Harbor Point, late last year to create a master plan and lead the redevelopment of about seven acres of underused land around the century-old train station. Beatty Development's vision calls for the construction of up to 1.5 million square feet of new residences and commercial space at a cost of about $500 million over the next decade.

Homes, offices and shops would sprout around Baltimore's Penn Station under a preliminary plan developed for Amtrak for the midtown site. The national passenger railroad tapped Beatty Development, the Baltimore-based developer responsible for Harbor East and Harbor Point, late last year to create a master plan and lead the redevelopment of about seven acres of underused land around the century-old train station. Beatty Development's vision calls for the construction of up to 1.5 million square feet of new residences and commercial space at a cost of about $500 million over the next decade.

Efforts to restore the Hampstead Train Station on Gill Avenue are moving ahead.The town has purchased the station, the Hampstead Train Station Committee reported at its March 3 meeting. Also, a tarp has been placed over the roof.Donations are being sought to cover the cost of restoration and the committee's incorporation. The incorporation is needed to receive funds from the National Historical Trust, Preservation Maryland and the Maryland Historical Society. Incorporation proceedings cost $450.

To the delight of many Hampstead residents, Maryland Midland Railway Inc. has contributed $500 to the restoration of the town's historic train depot.In a letter April 24, Paul D. Denton, Maryland Midland's president and chief operations officer, promised to contribute more after Maryland Midland completes its purchase of the line that runs through Hampstead. CSX Transportation Inc. owns the line."When our offer to purchase that line becomes reality, we'll double the amount in the attached check, and I'll deliver the second one personally by riding to Hampstead in one of our locomotives," Denton wrote.

SHARPSBURG -- Nearly a century ago, a timber-frame train station was built here on the right side of the tracks. Today, the building -- with ties to the Civil War -- is on the wrong side of the tracks.Antietam Station's location at the western edge of town, and the fact that it's situated on a small lot -- 0.3-acre -- have made it a hard sell for Washington County officials.They're looking for a temporary tenant -- maybe five to 20 years -- until the county can make better use of the building and its association with the nearby Antietam National Battlefield, the site of the bloodiest day of the Civil War.Tourism officials are not interested because most visitors come from interstate highways to the north.

You can't buy a ticket anymore, but the ticket window from the former Riderwood train station remains in place in the brick building that was transformed from whistle-stop to single-family home decades ago. The station was built around 1904 by the Northern Central Railroad, after the first station, which was a shed with a one-room station-and-general store, burned down. Passenger service on the two-car Parkton Local between Baltimore and Parkton was dropped in 1959 for lack of riders, and an NCR employee and his wife became the Riderwood station's first private owner residents a few years later.

As he played in his front yard on Saturdays, Nathan King would look across the street where, as he saw it, the grown-ups were having all the fun. It was spring 1998 and a dozen volunteers had begun to reverse the decades of neglect that nearly turned the Hampstead train station into a pile of rotting timber. By the fall, Nathan was 10, and he got up the courage to walk over to Wayne Thomas, chairman of the Hampstead Train Station Committee. "I asked how old you had to be to help," said Nathan, who turns 12 next month.

For many Carroll residents, a visit to the Pleasant Valley Christmas Train Garden is a touchstone of the holiday season that brings them back year after year. And each year for the past 30 years, there have been others who discover the garden's magic for the first time and make plans to return to the Pleasant Valley Community Fire Company station in pastoral hamlet of Pleasant Valley for a visit the following December as well. Mike Chrest, of Union Mills, a long-time volunteer firefighter, has been the principal curator and keeper of the roughly 18- by 18-foot HO-gauge train garden, which casts a warm glow in the dimly lit gallery-sized room where it is housed.

When I went to see "Pullman Porter Blues" at Arena Stage this month, not only was it an opportunity to see an excellent play, but it was also a chance to delve into my own heritage. Set in 1937, "Pullman Porter Blues" is the story of three generations of black pullman car porters, the highly trained, uniformed men who took care of every need, around the clock, of first-class, sleeping-car passengers. In the play, the grandfather, Monroe, appears happy to do the bidding of his white supervisor, but he has some tricks up his sleeve.

Train service to the BWI Thurgood Marshall train station was temporarily suspended Tuesday morning while police officers examined an unattended bag. According to Maryland Transit Administration spokesman Terry Owens, service was suspended around 6 a.m. after police officers received reports of a suspicious package left on the outdoor train platform. Owens said service to the station was suspended as a precaution, delaying trains on the MARC Penn Line, but it was restored by 7 a.m., after officers determined the package was no threat to passengers or employees.

For most of us, a trip to New York City means there will be rides on the Subway. Visits to Washington, D.C., are much more palatable when parking problems are traded for train rides on the Metro. Go to San Francisco or Oakland, Calif., and odds are a ride on the BART (short for Bay Area Transit) will be part of the itinerary. Chicago has its L (short for elevated). Boston has the T (short for transportation). Here in the greater Baltimore region, though, train transport is a realistic option only for commuters whose schedules are as regimented and predictable as the days of the week.

A small, defunct railroad that still has a big following will be the focus of presentations at the Old Line Museum in Delta, Pa. each Sunday in June from 1:30 p.m. to 4 p.m. Baldwin resident Jerome Murphy started the Ma & Pa Railroad Month in 1976. The first meetings were held at the Peach bottom railroad station. The Maryland and Pennsylvania railroad line, know as the Ma & Pa, formed in 1901 and ran a 77-mile route from Baltimore to York, Pa. There were 27 station stops, including Towson, Baldwin, Long Green, Glen Arm, Bel Air and Forest Hill.

In 15 years, Baldwin's Station has gone from the start-up stage to the forefront of fine dining. On Monday, April 16, the Sykesville restaurant was named Maryland's Favorite Restaurant for 2012 at the 58th McCormick and Company Stars of the Industry Awards Gala. The annual event, held at Martin's West in Baltimore, honored the state's top restaurants in 14 different categories. The Restaurant Association of Maryland tallied thousands of votes cast by the dining public. When the votes were counted, Baldwin's Station ranked ahead of five other finalists from around the state.

Everyone wanted a commuter train station for Odenton. The politicians, the locals, the new residents.Warren Halle banked on it when he proposed his Seven Oaks/Town Center project -- 4,700 homes, a commercial district and office buildings, the biggest development in Odenton's history.So Halle built a house of cards with a new MARC train station as its cornerstone. Alter any part of his blueprint, he warned, and the whole thing would tumble down.That's just what happened last week when the County Council adopted a bill restricting what could be built in the 218-acre Town Center parcel -- the last of the county's three commercial showplaces.

SPRING is on the verge of blooming, and so is the new vest-pocket park on Holly Avenue next to the historic Severna Park train station.The 300-foot-long wedge, to be called Hatton-Regester Green, will include a gazebo, extensive landscaping and period lighting, said Jack Keene, head of the park development committee.The Association for Severna Park Improvement, Renewal and Enhancement (ASPIRE) is collecting $25,000 to help pay for the land purchase. The money is coming from the sale of paving bricks etched with the donor's name ($100 each)

It had been a lot of years since I regularly made use of the Aberdeen train station when a friend of my daughter's was scheduled to visit and had taken the train from New England. Back when I made use of the train a few times a year, the MARC commuter rail system was in the planning phases, then in its infancy. One of the old train station buildings, as I recall, had been converted for use by a dry cleaner. The station itself was a mess, with two revolting features: the so-called Concrete Monster pedestrian bridge that linked the two sides of the track and the tunnel under the track that also linked the two sides, but which wasn't, and still isn't, handicapped compliant.

When it comes to customer service, Amtrak is easily derailed.  My nephew gave me an Amtrak gift certificate for Christmas. I tried to use it on Sunday when making reservations for travel to New York.   First, I went online. Nothing relevant could I see on the computer screen.  I called the Amtrak 800 number. The friendly man said I had to go to the train station to use the gift certificate.   On Monday, I went to Penn Station. The man at the counter made the reservations, then said he thought he'd better check with his manager to be sure the certificate could be used at his terminal.