52nd Street is a closed railroad station in the West Philadelphia section of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was built by the Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR) at the junction of its Main Line and its Schuylkill Branch. Today, these lines are the SEPTA Regional Rail Paoli/Thorndale Line and Cynwyd Line, respectively.
At 52nd Street, the Main Line is on an embankment at-grade, while the Schuylkill Branch is on an elevated structure including a Parker through truss spanning 388 feet (118 m) over the Main Line on an extreme skew. A lit sign informed inbound passengers which platform the next train to Center City, Philadelphia would depart from.
Through merger and bankruptcy, the station and the trains serving it passed from the PRR to the Penn Central to Conrail, which abandoned all service to the station in 1980. Proposals have been made to reopen the station, either in conjunction with projects such as the Schuylkill Valley Metro, or as part of community revitalization efforts.
Famous quotes containing the words street and/or railroad:
“I mount the steps and ring the bell, turning
Wearily, as one would turn to nod good-bye to Rochefoucauld,
If the street were time and he at the end of the street,
And I say, “Cousin Harriet, here is the Boston Evening Transcript.””
—T.S. (Thomas Stearns)
“This I saw when waking late,
Going by at a railroad rate,
Looking through wreaths of engine smoke
Far into the lives of other folk.”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)