Raleigh Union Station | |||||||||||||||||||||||
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General information | |||||||||||||||||||||||
Location | 510 West Martin Street Raleigh, North Carolina United States | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Coordinates | 35°46′38″N78°38′50″W / 35.7772°N 78.6472°W | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Owned by | City of Raleigh | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Line(s) | NCRR Corridor | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Platforms | 1 island platform | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Tracks | 2 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Connections | GoRaleigh: 13, R-Line | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Construction | |||||||||||||||||||||||
Structure type | At-grade | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Parking | Yes; paid | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Bicycle facilities | Racks [1] | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Accessible | Yes | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Architect | Clearscapes | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Architectural style | Modern | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Other information | |||||||||||||||||||||||
Station code | Amtrak: RGH | ||||||||||||||||||||||
History | |||||||||||||||||||||||
Opened | July 10, 2018 [2] | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Passengers | |||||||||||||||||||||||
FY 2022 | 171,091 [3] (Amtrak) | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Services | |||||||||||||||||||||||
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Location | |||||||||||||||||||||||
Raleigh Union Station is an intermodal transit station in Raleigh, North Carolina, United States. Train service began the morning of July 10, 2018. Its main building serves as an Amtrak train station, while a future adjacent building will serve as the bus terminus for GoTriangle. The station is located at the Boylan Wye, a railroad junction used by CSX and Norfolk Southern, and adjacent to the Depot Historic District in downtown Raleigh.
As of fiscal year 2018, it is the second busiest station in North Carolina, behind Charlotte, and one of the busiest in the Southeast. [4]
On April 23, 2010, the City of Raleigh proposed an extensive multimodal transit center a few blocks west of the site of the 1890 Union Depot to serve the Southeast High Speed Rail Corridor, conventional Amtrak trains, future commuter rail over the North Carolina Railroad, as well as Capital Area Transit local, Triangle Transit regional, and Greyhound intercity buses. The name of the project, "Union Station," pays homage to the former Union Depot, which was commonly referred to as Union Station; the original depot operated from 1890–1950. [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11]
On June 29, 2011, North Carolina Department of Transportation (NCDOT) proposed a less expensive plan that would relocate the Amtrak station to an abandoned industrial site, known locally as the Viaduct Building, within the Boylan Wye, some 800 feet north of Amtrak's then-facility from corner to corner. [12] [13] The plan focused on Amtrak's needs, with provisions to add commuter rail and SEHSR later. [14] [15] [16] [17]
Station and track design began in 2013 and was completed in late 2014. The environmental assessment was approved on March 12, 2014. On March 3, 2015, the Raleigh City Council approved full funding for the station, $88.8 million (Local $25.9M, State $9M, Federal TIGER/ARRA $53.9M); additional funds of $21.6 million (State 5$5.1M and Federal $16.5M) were also provided for supporting project costs. [18] A ceremonial groundbreaking followed on May 9, while actual start of construction began in January 2016. [19] [20] [21] [22] [23]
On April 30, 2018, a dedication ceremony was held at the station with various city and state officials, including Raleigh Mayor Nancy McFarlane, U.S. Representative David Price and State Senator Nelson Dollar. [24] [25]
Opened in 1890, the Union Depot (also referred as Union Station) was constructed by the Raleigh and Gaston Railroad, a predecessor of the Seaboard Air Line, at the corner of Dawson and West Martin streets. It also served the original Norfolk Southern Railway and Southern Railway, with a total of four tracks. The station was reached by trackage from the nearby Boylan Wye where the North Carolina Railroad (operated by Southern), the original Norfolk Southern, and the Seaboard converged. [26]
Being a stub-end station, Union Depot was inconvenient to operate, especially as passenger trains became longer and obstructed the Boylan Wye. Seaboard left the station in 1942 and Southern in 1950, by which time the original Norfolk Southern had discontinued its passenger trains. [27] [28] [29]
The head-house of the 1890 Union Depot survives as an office building, minus its tower. The former platform area and viaduct were subsequently redeveloped as industrial property.
Opened in 1942, the Seaboard station was located north of downtown at 707 Semart Drive, adjacent to Seaboard's freight yard. Seaboard merged with the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad as the Seaboard Coast Line Railroad. Into the latter 1960s the Seaboard Air Line, and then the Seaboard Coast line operated the New York-Florida Silver Meteor and Silver Star trains and the Portsmouth, Virginia-Jacksonville Tidewater through the new station. The SAL/SCL also ran the Silver Comet train bound southwest to Athens, Atlanta and Birmingham through the station as well. [30] [31]
In 1971, passenger operations were taken over by Amtrak, which leased the station from SCL. The station's ownership passed to CSX Corporation when SCL's parent company, Seaboard Coast Line Industries, merged with Chessie System. By January 16, 1972, the Silver Meteor was rerouted east through Florence and Charleston, South Carolina. [32]
In 1985, CSX abandoned its S-Line (the former SAL main line) between Norlina, North Carolina and Petersburg, Virginia. Amtrak was forced to reroute its trains between Raleigh and the Northeast through Selma along the CSX A-Line and the North Carolina Railroad. The Seaboard station could not easily accommodate the reroute, so Amtrak moved all operations to the smaller Southern station. The Seaboard station was subsequently repurposed as a retail space and a restaurant.
Opened in 1950, by Southern Railway, the Colonial Revival station was located at 320 West Cabarrus Street, two blocks south of the current Raleigh Union Station. Until the early 1950s the Southern Railway ran the Carolina Special and two other trains daily from Greensboro, through Raleigh, to Goldsboro, where an Atlantic Coast Line Railroad connection could be made to Wilmington. The Carolina Special western destination was Cincinnati. [33] In 1964, Southern withdrew its final trains from Raleigh, local trains to Greensboro to the west and Goldsboro to the east, [34] and then closed the station. The station was repurposed for storage, leaving the old Seaboard station as the sole passenger rail station in Raleigh for the next 21 years.
In 1985, CSX abandoned the S-Line between Norlina and Petersburg. Amtrak opted to move its services to the smaller Southern station, which was better suited for the new route that ran through Selma. That year, the North Carolina Railroad acquired the station from Norfolk Southern (formed three years earlier as a merger between Southern and N&W) and renovated the station, then leased it to Amtrak. Passenger rail service resumed in 1986.
At 10:14pm, on July 9, 2018, the Piedmont #78 was the final train to arrive at the station; the following day, all passenger rail service was relocated to the Raleigh Union Station and the former Southern/Amtrak station was officially closed. [35] Demolition of the Southern station finished on August 1, 2018 in order to relocate the NS main freight track.[ citation needed ]
Preceding station | Seaboard Air Line Railroad | Following station | ||
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Cary | Main Line | Wake Forest toward Richmond | ||
Preceding station | Southern Railway | Following station | ||
Method toward North Wilkesboro | North Wilkesboro – Morehead City | Garner toward Morehead City |
Operated by Amtrak, the station is served by ten trains per day.
The facility is open daily at 6:00am–11:00pm, which includes a ticket office, passenger assistance, baggage service and a civic hall (waiting area). [36] [37] [38]
Short-term and disability parking is available at the front of the station (meter, two-hour limit). Long-term parking is located in The Dillon parking garage at 223 South West Street. The garage is open 24-hours and accepts payment only by credit/debit card. [38] [39]
Route 13 of GoRaleigh serves the station 6 am to 6:57 pm, seven days a week. [40] The R-LINE downtown circulator, a free ride, once served the station but has been suspended since 2021.
The station has four levels identified as Street, Main, Lower Mezzanine and Upper Mezzanine. It has 26,000 square feet (2,400 m2) of building space, with 9,200 square feet (850 m2) of passenger rail space. The island platform is 920 ft (280 m) long, offering level boarding and is fully accessible compliant; it is the first high-level platform in North Carolina, [18] [41] and one of two high-level platforms south of Washington on Amtrak lines, the other being Roanoke. [42]
Station layout | ||
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S | Street Level | Entrance/Exit |
M | Main Level | Ticketing, Civic Hall (waiting area), to Entrance/Exit |
Concourse | To tracks 1 and 2 | |
LM | Lower Mezzanine | |
UM | Upper Mezzanine | Wine & Design [43] |
P | Track 2 | ← Silver Star toward Miami (Cary) ← Carolinian and Piedmont toward Charlotte (Cary or NC State Fair) |
Island platform (Platform A) | ||
Track 1 | Silver Star toward New York (Rocky Mount) → Carolinian toward New York (Selma) → |
The station is designed for significant future expansion. A second island platform and third track, along the Norfolk Southern H-Line, are planned to serve the under-development Durham-Wake commuter rail line. A northern concourse, with a new island platform and station track, on the CSX Aberdeen Subdivision (also known as the S-Line) is planned for the future Southeast High Speed Rail Corridor. [13] [44] [45] [46]
In December 2023, NCDOT was awarded nearly $1.09 billion in Federal Railroad Administration grants that will be used to upgrade the Aberdeen Subdivision between Raleigh and Wake Forest. [47] With construction along the line to begin in 2024, NCDOT has a tentative completion date of 2030, which includes the station's northern concourse expansion. [48]
On the southwest corner of West and Hargett Streets, GoTriangle plans to build a bus terminal, referred to as Raleigh Union Station Bus (RUS Bus) on a 1.77-acre (0.72 ha) site. Designed by Perkins Eastman and developed by Hoffman and Associates, it will feature a 6-10 bay off-street transit facility, with two high-rise buildings on top and a pedestrian bridge that connects directly to Raleigh Union Station. [49] Amenities include 350 unit apartments, 200 room hotel, 18,000 square feet (1,700 m2) for retail, and 550 space parking garage. Estimated to cost $40.4 million (2018 US dollars), $20 million of which is covered by a 2018 Build Grant by the U.S. Department of Transportation, with the remaining through local and state funds. [50] Scheduled to open in 2025, RUS Bus will serve as a secondary Downtown Raleigh hub for GoRaleigh, and GoTriangle, supplementing the existing GoRaleigh Station at Moore Square. [41] [51] [52] [53]
The Silver Star is a long-distance passenger train operated by Amtrak on a 1,522-mile (2,449 km) route between New York City and Miami via Washington, D.C., Richmond, Virginia, Raleigh, North Carolina, Columbia, South Carolina, Savannah, Georgia, Jacksonville, Florida, and Tampa, Florida. The Silver Star and its sister train in the Silver Service brand, the Silver Meteor, are the descendants of numerous long-distance trains that operated between Florida and New York for most of the 20th century.
The Southeast Corridor (SEC) is a proposed passenger rail transportation project in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern United States to extend high-speed passenger rail services from the current southern terminus of the Northeast Corridor in Washington, D.C.. Routes would extend south via Richmond and Petersburg, Virginia, with a spur to Norfolk in Virginia's Hampton Roads region; the mainline would continue south to Raleigh, Durham, Greensboro, and Charlotte, North Carolina. Since the corridor was first established in 1992, the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) has extended it further to Atlanta, Georgia and Macon, Georgia; Greenville, South Carolina; Columbia, South Carolina; Jacksonville, Florida; and Birmingham, Alabama.
The North Carolina Department of Transportation (NCDOT) is responsible for building, repairing, and operating highways, bridges, and other modes of transportation, including ferries in the U.S. state of North Carolina.
Petersburg station is an Amtrak railroad station located at 3516 South Street in Ettrick, Virginia just outside the city of Petersburg. However, like most of Ettrick, it has a Petersburg address. The station was built in 1955 by the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad (ACL) and services nearby Virginia State University and its home field, Rogers Stadium, both a short walk from the station.
Charlotte station is an Amtrak station located at 1914 North Tryon Street, about 1.5 miles (2.4 km) to the northeast of Uptown Charlotte. Owned by Norfolk Southern, it is located near that railroad's yard outside Uptown.
Cary station is an active train station located in Cary, North Carolina. It is served by three Amtrak trains: the Silver Star, Carolinian, and Piedmont services. Service from the Cary station is to Charlotte, Miami, New York, and points in between.
Wilson is an Amtrak train station in Wilson, North Carolina, United States. It is located in downtown Wilson and is part of the Wilson Central Business-Tobacco Warehouse Historic District.
Rocky Mount station, officially the Helen P. Gay Rocky Mount Historic Train Station, is an intermodal transit station in Rocky Mount, North Carolina, United States. Its main building serves as an Amtrak train station, while an adjacent building serves as the bus terminus for the Tar River Transit and as a Greyhound stop. The station is located just south of downtown Rocky Mount and is part of the Rocky Mount Central City Historic District.
Hamlet station is an Amtrak train station in Hamlet, North Carolina, United States. The station is located within the Main Street Commercial Historic District and is in walking distance to the National Railroad Museum and Hall of Fame.
The Goldsboro Union Station is a former passenger train depot and future intermodal transit station in Goldsboro, North Carolina, United States. Originally operating from 1909 to 1968, the Eclectic two-story brick depot was preserved as one of the most ambitious railroad structures in North Carolina, built as a symbol of the importance of railroading to Goldsboro. Currently closed-off for future renovations, the five-acre (2.0 ha) facility also includes the GWTA Bus Transfer Center.
Charlotte Gateway Station is a future intermodal transit station in Charlotte, North Carolina, United States. Currently operating as a streetcar stop for the CityLynx Gold Line, with an adjoining bus station for Greyhound Lines intercity buses, it is the centerpiece of the overall 19-acre (7.7 ha) Station District, and it will serve Charlotte Area Transit System (CATS) bus lines, the Lynx Silver Line light rail, Amtrak intercity trains. The district will also include parking facilities, mixed-use development and an elevated greenway. Estimated at a cost of $800.1 million for full implementation of all public and private components, the project will be built in three phases, with Amtrak service tentatively scheduled to start in 2026–2027.
The Carolinian is a daily Amtrak passenger train that runs between New York City and Charlotte, North Carolina, with major stops in Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, Richmond, Raleigh, Cary, Durham, and Greensboro. The 704-mile (1,133 km) service is the longest state-supported route in the Amtrak system. Northbound trains leave Charlotte at breakfast time and arrive in New York in the early evening, while southbound trains leave New York during the morning rush and arrive in Charlotte in the evening.
The Piedmont is a regional passenger train operated by Amtrak and the North Carolina Department of Transportation (NCDOT), running four round trips daily between Raleigh and Charlotte, North Carolina. It is a sister train to the Carolinian, which runs from Charlotte to New York City. The Piedmont route is coextensive with the far southern leg of the Carolinian, largely paralleling Interstate 85. It operates along the far western leg of the state-owned North Carolina Railroad, which runs from Charlotte to Morehead City. Operations began in May 1995.
This article is intended to give an overview of transportation in North Carolina.
Hillsborough station is a planned infill train station in Hillsborough, North Carolina, located on the North Carolina Railroad (NCRR). According to town officials, the station building will have a meeting space, similar to Kannapolis station. When it is completed, Amtrak's Carolinian and Piedmont will serve the station. It will be the nearest Amtrak station to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
On March 9, 2015, an Amtrak passenger train derailed in Halifax, North Carolina, after colliding with a truck carrying an oversize load that was obstructing the line at a grade crossing. There were no fatalities, but 55 people were injured.
The Aberdeen Subdivision is a railroad line owned by CSX Transportation in North Carolina. The line runs along CSX's S Line from Raleigh, North Carolina, to Marston, North Carolina, for a total of 86.9 miles. At its north end it continues south from the Norlina Subdivision and at its south end it continues south as the Hamlet Terminal Subdivision.
The Norlina Subdivision is a railroad line owned by CSX Transportation in the U.S. State of North Carolina. The line currently runs from Norlina, North Carolina, to Raleigh, North Carolina, for a total of 51.2 miles. At its north end the line comes to an end and at its south end the line continues north from the Aberdeen Subdivision. While the current line dates back to 1840, it has been known as the Norlina Subdivision since the 1970s. Under CSX's predecessor, the Seaboard Coast Line Railroad, the Norlina Subdivision continued north to Collier Yard near Petersburg, Virginia.
NC By Train is a brand name used by the Rail Division of the North Carolina Department of Transportation (NCDOT) for two state-supported Amtrak routes operating in the U.S. state of North Carolina–the Carolinian and the Piedmont.
Wake Forest station is a planned train station in Wake Forest, North Carolina, located on the S-Line and Southeast High Speed Rail Corridor (SEC). When it is completed, Amtrak's Piedmont will serve the station.