Context: The Abandoned Westchester Avenue Railroad Station
Information: The abandoned Westchester Avenue station is a former railroad station located in the Longwood section of the South Bronx, near Westchester Avenue and Sheridan Boulevard. Built in 1908, the station was designed by prominent architect Cass Gilbert, who later used similar decorative terra-cotta details in his design for the Woolworth Building. Passenger service ended in 1937, and the station has remained abandoned ever since, gradually deteriorating into a severely damaged ruin.
The structure is unusual because part of it is suspended above Amtrak’s busy Northeast Corridor. The taller entrance hall stands on solid ground west of the tracks, while the shorter waiting-room section extends over the railroad on steel beams. Staircases once led from the station down to low-level platforms beside the tracks, but those stairs and platforms were removed many years ago.
The station’s exterior still contains colorful glazed terra-cotta ornamentation, including a caduceus near the roofline with the letters “NYH.” This likely refers to the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad, which built the station, although the same symbol was also used by the New York, Westchester and Boston Railway, which also served the location. By 2009, the building was considered dangerously unstable. Of Cass Gilbert’s other surviving Bronx stations, Bartow was also abandoned, while Morris Park and Hunts Point were later reused for other purposes.
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