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Sandpoint Northern Pacific depot to be repaired
What a beautiful, classic example of the American small town station. It would be good to see it repaired and restored for any purpose, but making it a working station again is great.
Editing point: in first graf, change “passenger’s can only access” to “passengers can only access.” [Sorry to be a pill, but careless use of apostrophes to form the plural is epidemic.]
Great to see more Passenger Rail infrastructure improvements!
Former GN station signs from (N) Sandpoint relocated c.1973 in conjunction w/construction of new connection from ex-NP to ex-GN mains E-of (NP) Sandpoint depot to Boyer E-of old GN depot. All account routing of through BN movements over former NP’s main (designated locally as “the funnel”) from Spokane, and directly related-to consolidation w/UP through downtown for “Expo '74” development on Havermale Island (former GN/SP&S Spokane depot site).
This story about the Sandpoint depot is great news. Sandpoint is a great small city in a very scenic spot in northern Idaho. Quite frankly the old depot is a disgrace for this city so I am glad it will be rebuilt.
$920K to fix the building?
They going to gold plate the roof.
How do these public projects come up with such outrageously
inflated costs?
Seems every Amtrak capital project is bloated.
Management, anyone?
Restoring the depot for passenger use will help the most for winter travelers since they will now have a warm indoor place to wait in, and also passengers will have access to toilet facilities, too.
Wish folks would learn what the project consists of before complaining about the cost. Still waiting for the depot in Grand Junction Colorado to reopen. It has been at least 15 years and the roof alone must cost a couple hundred thousand. When done, if ever, a million would be a bargain.
TIMOTHY VINCENTfrom VERMONT said:
“$920K to fix the building?
They going to gold plate the roof.
How do these public projects come up with such outrageously
inflated costs?
Seems every Amtrak capital project is bloated.
Management, anyone?”
The $920,000 was originally set aside as money to potentially build a new station outside of town as the current station would be rendered useless by construction of the Sand Creek bypass. You’re not likely to get any building with $920,000, just a platform and maybe a shelter, which is inadequate in the northern part of the United States. Fortunately, the money is now being redirected to repairing the current Amtrak station, on the National Register of Historic places, and has suffered from years of neglect. The $920,000 will not be able to cover all the work needed on this facility, but will allow the station to become usable as a passenger facility.
Anyone who thinks $920,000 is “outrageously inflated” is just ignorant of what things cost.
I’m glad to hear that the Sandpoint station is being restored. When the HWY project got underway I was afraid that this beautiful old building would be torn down.