Hampton Bays
Southampton is an example of how to fit a high-level platform in font of an existing historic building that has wide wooden canopies extending from it in each direction. The historic station was built in 1902 and has a small building with unique walls that look like they're made of concrete and tile with brick trim. The building has a highly gabled roof with a chimney. Wide porches form a platform canopy and are attached to the building extending about 200 feet in each direction. Numerous beams hold up these porches with the lower portion of the beams painted a greenish color and tops painted white. Inside the building is a small waiting area with a ticket window open seasonally on Summer Sunday afternoons, an intact fireplace (the brickwork is still there), and sets of wooden benches with one along each wall and a unique circular central bench. A restroom is located through an archway in a small vestibule beyond one end of the waiting room. The walls are painted an off-white color with the trim painted white.
The station was retrofitted in the late 1990s with an extremely narrow (maybe five foot wide) platform that can accommodate 8 cars and is directly below the front edge of the station's long porches, extending beyond these porches. The reason the platform is so narrow is to keep the wooden beams that hold up the porches intact and not have them run through the platform. A unique solution to lighting the platform was found with boxes for florescent lights attached directly the platform railing. The ADA ramp can't fit within the beamwork of the platform so it's at the extreme eastern end of the platform. Numerous staircases lead directly off the platform to the covered area at sidewalk-level (that what was once the wider, low-level platform). The LED next train Information signs even hang directly from the canopy and cover low-level area and not the platform (there wouldn't be enough headroom). The station is along the Southampton Siding with two tracks in the station area (that become one just west of the station before trains cross over North Main Street on a narrow bridge). The siding continues east of the platform with a middle switch meaning trains can meet and pass and both stop at the station.
The station is directly along Railroad Plaza (that becomes Powell Avenue to the east) with Maple Street ending directly at the platform, along with Elm Street. Main Street is down a steep driveway (it goes under the tracks in an underpass) just east of the station. There is a small parking lot (with unrestricted spaces) across Railroad Plaza that contains most of the stations approximately 135 parking spaces. A circle of greenery across from the station in this small parking area has a green sign that reads "Est. 1640: Welcome to the Incorporated Village of Southampton, The Oldest English Settlement in the State of New York."
All Photos: 16 August, 2015
