180 Years

I found myself in Greenport NY for a project and was pleasantly surprised by the presence of the old train station there.

It’s not the current station, which is a bare concrete platform off to the right of the picture, and it’s not the original station, but that’s okay. As you can see from the sign, it’s now used as a museum.

Greenport was a fishing village that is now more of a tourist town – although I did see a number of commercial fishing boats in the harbor – but one of its bigger claims to fame is that it was the eastern terminus of the original Long Island Railroad. That 1844 route ran from a ferry landing on the Brooklyn waterfront to Greenport, 96 miles away. For 1844, that was quite the accomplishment.

That route still exists, as the Brooklyn and Ronkonkoma branches of the complicated tree network of the current LIRR.

The old station is an 1890s replacement for the 1870s replacement of the original station. It has some significant masonry erosion, possibly from splash damage, possibly from rising damp, and possibly just from its exposed location right next to the harbor. Here’s some damage:

And here’s the station (with the dark gray hip roof) and some fishing boats: