Great Train Stations in North America: 5

Amherst Virginia: Southern Railway

When you visit some train stations you just know you will never see them again. Mainly because you know they will not be in that location much longer. You know they will either be torn down, burned down, or moved. Only occasionally when they get to be this bad do they get to be "restored" and turned into something like a restaurant or Visitor's Center. Thus, you realize this is a once in a lifetime stop, and you are not sad about that situation. For this is a station you really do not want to come back to.

So it is for this station we found one day in Amherst Virginia just to the north of Lynchburg Virginia. It was an old Southern Railway Depot that was obviously on its last legs. It still sat on Depot Street beside the active Washington DC to Atlanta Mainline of the Norfolk Southern Railroad. At one time it was no doubt busy with passengers boarding and de-boarding from various passenger trains, maybe even the fabled Crescent. But now Amtrak's Cresent passes by about mid-night with nary a nod to this old station.

Surely, sadly, I suspect its days are numbered and soon will be no more. And thus, I will not see it any more.