In a town that has seen an incredible transformation in the past few years, Bloomfield’s dilapidated train station is one of the few structures that time has seemingly forgotten. The station hall has been abandoned for decades, the walls and stairs are crumbling, and trees are growing out of fissures in cement.
One of NJ Transit’s first initiatives after acquiring the station from the local government is to give the station a much needed renovation. The New Jersey Debt Defeasance and Prevention Fund has allocated $48 million, according to NJ Transit, though the proposed cost of the renovations could exceed that amount by as much as $11 million.
“Right now the station is in terrible condition,” said Rich Shaefer, senior vice president at NJ Transit. “It’s one that’s been on my bucket list to take care of for a while.”
But Shaefer’s efforts have gone a bit off track. His company presented a restoration plan last August to the state Historic Sites Council, which reviews changes to buildings listed on the National Register. The board of preservationists denied the application and is requiring NJ Transit to resubmit its plans.
One of the priorities of NJ Transit’s plan is to make the station more accessible for passengers with mobility issues. How to achieve that, while making as few alterations to the historic station as possible, is the issue at hand. One of the proposed improvements includes adding new elevators on both in-bound and out-bound station halls. Yet, it was the NJ Transit’s desire to raise the platforms four feet higher to be grade level with the train doors that drew concern from the state council members.
Stantec, the architectural firm hired to oversee the project, came up with eight different proposals to restore the station. The one that NJ Transit preferred requires demolishing the existing inbound and outbound platforms and replacing then with taller platforms.
The new platforms in their preferred design included what architects call a staircase “well” to allow access between the waiting room, which would be below the grade of the raised platform. This technique is used at Newark Broad Street where the platform is slightly higher than the waiting hall entrance.
However, raising the platform would also require demolishing the historic clay-tile canopies that cover the platforms, and reconstructing them. This became a sticking point.
Another alternative that the Historic Sites Council seemed to prefer is using mobile lifts in combinations with what transit organizations called “mini-highs,” which are grade level to the train doors, but located at both ends of the platform. This is the method used at South Orange Station.
But Schaefer said it would inconvenience mobility-impaired passengers and require them to travel even farther.
“It’s not really fair to the people who are mobility-limited and are impaired to the point where they need real access across,” Shaefer said. “That’s why that’s not our standard practice.”
Shaefer said that ridership has increased 15 percent each quarter and it’s projected to become 2,000 people per day. As one of the busiest stations on the Montclair-Boonton line, he believes the entire platform should be grade level to the train doors to avoid delays created by mobile lifts and prevent crowding around the mini-high platforms.
However, Sophia Jones Bradford, vice chair of the Historic Sites Council, cautioned her colleagues “not to forget why we’re here.”
“I completely respect the need to provide safe access to rail passengers, but we are here because of the resource and the resource is the station.”
“I do not believe that enough thought has been put into trying to respectfully marry the impact on the historic resource,” she continued. “Do we have the best design that marries the requirements and the need to provide safe public access to rail passengers?”
Bradford said she was hoping for a “middle ground” between the two preferred designs before NJ Transit makes “irreversible” changes to the historic station.
“I also feel like there probably can be a little more thought put into the placement of things,” Bradford said. “Someone’s experience coming to a station is not just about boarding a train, it’s about what they are experiencing around them.”
The outbound station hall was gutted in a 1979 fire and has remained empty ever since. Ridership on the line was languishing before it received a shot in the arm when it became part of the Montclair Connection in 2002.
The station’s architecture is attributed to architect Frank Nies, though it is believed that William Hull Botsford, who died on the Titanic before the station opened in 1912, also contributed to the design. In 1984, the station became one of three along the former Delaware, Lackawanna, and Western Railroad, Co., to become listed on the National Register.
“The Bloomfield Station is an exceptional achievement among the suburban facilities of the D, L & W line,” the National Register listing reads.
