Workers haul out chairs from the Pawtucket/Central Falls Station, which closed as a train depot in 1959 but is being considered as a potential commuter rail station. The project could help revitalize parts of Pawtucket, city officials say.
Built in 1915, the Pawtucket/Central Falls Station has been the home of a rail depot, a flea market and a Pentecostal church.
Now, as the cities look to redevelop the blighted property, it could serve another purpose – the spark for the revitalization of one of Pawtucket’s more downtrodden areas.
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In an interview last week, Mayor James E. Doyle said the city is examining the feasibility of rehabbing the building for its original use as a train station. The depot, which closed in 1959, joins the Providence and Worcester Railroad Co. freight yard as one of two properties being examined for a Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority rail stop in a city-commissioned feasibility study.
However, according to Doyle, the rehabilitation of the depot would give the city more than a train station. It would present Pawtucket with an opportunity to spark redevelopment in an area that needs it more than almost any part of town.
Straddling the Pawtucket and Central Falls line, the project could be a catalyst in the Barton Street neighborhood, Doyle said, one that has been home to “prostitution and all sorts of neighborhood problems” for years.
The city has worked with Rhode Island Housing, the Pawtucket Foundation and Blackstone Valley Community Action for years trying to develop a solution to the woes of the neighborhood. With a functioning train station in the area, the added traffic could bring an influx of residential and commercial development, Doyle said.
“What we’re doing basically is trying to revitalize the area,” Doyle said. “This would be a great watershed development to start it off. It would bring new buildings there; it would bring people. It would be just a major, major rejuvenation project for the city.”
Michael Cassidy, Pawtucket’s director of planning and redevelopment, said that transportation has helped the city in the past and could again in the future. The construction of Interstate 95, which passes through the heart of Pawtucket, made the city an easier sell to people looking to work or go to school in Boston.
But as highway use increased, so did traffic, Cassidy said. Road congestion has made it more difficult for commuters. Cassidy said that he hopes mass transit could alleviate the burden on commuters in the future.
“The expansion of rapid transit is what in the future is going to provide additional and better access to jobs, access to shopping, access to recreational activities and access to schools,” Cassidy said.
The feasibility of the project is being studied by Vanasse Hangen Brustlin, a Watertown, Mass.-based planning and design firm.
According to project manager David Wilcock, the study is looking at three factors: The first will be the feasibility of adding a stop in Pawtucket. Should the stop be deemed feasible, the firm will be asked to recommend which of the two proposed sites best fits the project and what the station would look like.
Wilcock said that VHB is working with agencies including the R.I. Department of Environmental Manage-ment, the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority and Amtrak on that aspect of the study, which will look to answer conceptual and financial questions regarding the project.
“We need to find out what the answers are and how much the answer will cost in order to put a train back in either of these two locations,” said Wilcock, who is VHB’s manager of planning and operations for transit and rail services.
The study is expected to be completed by January 2007, he said.
While Wilcock said the depot site could provide more opportunities for the cities because of its location, there are some problems with the property.
For example, Cassidy said, the site’s current recognized owner, Memphis, Tenn.-based SMPO Properties, is entrenched in a legal battle over the title for the property.
In April, the Pawtucket Redevelopment Agency voted to put the depot back on the city’s list of possible eminent-domain acquisitions – a move that was lost on a tie vote by the City Council last year.
But Doyle said the acquisition is possible if a deal cannot be worked out with the owner.
“What we’re trying to do is work out some process where we can work with [the owner] on the project or work with eminent domain,” Doyle said.
Cassidy does not want to lose time on the project and believes that the city should proceed with the eminent-domain purchase and let it and SMPO wrangle over the price.
Looking to the future, Cassidy said he sees the potential for a Pawtucket train station to be a key part in a rail system that connects the state. Already, MBTA stops are planned for T.F. Green Airport in Warwick and for Wickford Village in North Kingstown.
The end result could be a railway that allows Pawtucket and Central Falls residents easier access to work at T.F. Green or to education programs at the University of Rhode Island’s Kingston campus.
“As much as there is the opportunity to go north into Boston and into those job markets and schools, there will also be the opportunity in the next 10 years to go south for jobs and school as well,” Cassidy said.
