Nostalgia & History > EL train passing the stations in Akron

Dec 1975
An eastbound passes the abandoned stations in Akron,Oh.
A U25B ? leads with an RS3 and a couple cabooses on the headend.
The station behind the train was the old Erie/EL after the platforms etc had been dismantled.
Below is part of Akron Union Depot for the B&O and earlier, PRR.
Looks like the mail/express building on the left.
The EL station (last train the Lake Cities in Jan 1970) is long gone while the B&O Capital Limited was the last one at Union Depot (right up to Amtrak) has been remodeled over the years and is still there - sort of.
Both stations were built around 1950 to replace the 1891 Union Station (about a mile away).

Gary

 

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Interesting image, and thank you for the history of it all too.
—Mac

An Erie Lackawanna GE/GE/ALCO lashup followed by two EL cabooses with the remains of the EL passenger station and the mail/express building for the B&O - Superlative!!!
Bob

In the early 90's I was living in Cleveland, internet railroad discussions were done on email lists and Usenet News bulletin boards, and photos were hard to share online.  Someone described how to find the stations in Akron, and I drove down one weekend to "roster" them.  I located the buildings shown but...still wasn't sure I'd found the depots.  Without platforms, they were so un-depot-like that I was hesitant to spend precious frames of film on what might not be depots after all (thanks to a lack of self-discipline, I did anyway).  The E-L freight house in the left background was the one building I was sure of - still had Erie diamonds cast into the headhouse portion above the windows. 

A cool (literally) look back. The locomotives are nothing out of the ordinary for that time frame and yes, that's a U25B up front. The real interest here for anyone from this area is everything around the train, much of which is gone or greatly altered today. Of course the EL infrastructure is all long gone today. Their old depot is now a bank (mostly new construction), the Erie freight house was torn down and student high rise housing was built on that location. Those diamonds mentioned on it were actually saved and are displyed on the Broadway side of the new high rise.The former Union Station platform and such is gone, although the main building and walkway over the tracks remains as part of the U of A called the Buckingham building. The express building remains with a multi-story Gas Turbine Testing facility built next to it. The rotating Akron beacon Journal (newspaper) time/temp sign was still in use in your photo. It's gone today. The E. Exchange St bridge has since been rebuilt. Pretty much the one thing that hasn't changed is the December weather.... 

Roger Durfee
Akron, OH

Roger - After the Beacon deserted that building there were questions about it being saved.
I heard it has been - is that true ?
I hope so, my dad worked there for 34 years.
Gary

gcm Wrote:
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> Roger - After the Beacon deserted that building
> there were questions about it being saved.
> I heard it has been - is that true ?
> I hope so, my dad worked there for 34 years.
> Gary

 Gary, haven't heard any official word on that, but it still stands and is in decent shape.

Roger Durfee
Akron, OH