Interesting sign on the River Line (West Shore)

While trying to locate old New York Central Railroad stations on the River Line (West Shore) in Rockland County, New York and Bergen County, New Jersey this past weekend, we found an interesting sign while crossing the railroad at the grade crossing at Broadway in West Norwood, New Jersey. It indicated property for sale, Penn Central Real Estate Company, 466 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY. We took a photo of the sign and as soon as we get it developed, it will be posted. Interestingly, the sign looked relatively new, considering Penn Central hasn't existed for 20 years and 466 Lexington Avenue is also long gone. I'm going to post this on the New York Central discussion board and the Penn Central discussion board.

Penn Central still exisit as a holding company, it is whats left of the former railroad.

When I first started working the West Shore (River Line) in very early
1974, there was the wooden remains of an old station at West Norwood.
If I remember correctly, there was a island of land between two streets on
the west side of the track with Broadway on one side and Blanche Avenue
on the other side. I would suspect that that parcel of land was of no value
to Conrail and probably no particular value to much else either as it was
and is probably too small for anything much.
I am really surprised that the property is still sort of railroad owned given
that New Jersey has taxed railroad property very heavily over the years.
The New York Central, Penn Central etc probably would have been better
off to just donate that property to the town or to someone or something
else rather than to hold on to it and pay taxes all these years on it.
It probably has not served any railroad purpose since the end of the
passenger trains around 1960.
Noel Weaver

Noel, thanks for the information. Was the station located on the west side between Blanche Avenue and Broadway? There now are two buildings on this parcel of land; one at the Broadway end and one at the Blanche Avenue end.

UpperHarlemLine4ever wrote:Noel, thanks for the information. Was the station located on the west side between Blanche Avenue and Broadway? There now are two buildings on this parcel of land; one at the Broadway end and one at the Blanche Avenue end.

YES, the old abandoned building was on the WEST side of the track.
Noel Weaver

The West Norwood station housed a shoe repair shop for a brief period in the early '60's, then was vacant for a long period, and was the victim of several fires in the late '60's. Mr. Weaver, not to doubt you, but I think all that remained of this once proud building was the foundation in 1974. I've always wanted to model that structure, but I never had the time to do the research. But boy, if you were working for PC at the time, you might have caused me to get home late many a Friday or Saturday night as trains frequently broke down and blocked the grade crossings in Harrington Park and Norwood in those days.
The sign you saw was just cleaned up in the past few years. The land for sale is a sliver north of Broadway east of the tracks, there were similar signs erected in the mid-late '70's from Dumont north, all parcels anywhere from 15-50 feet wide of varying lengths. The original signs actually had a rough map of the lot specified at each posting. The only sign I've seen lately is the one on Broadway. But I haven't crossed up in Northvale in 30 years, maybe a ride is called for tonight!

By the way, there's a thread about this on the New Jersey Railfan forum...

The land once for sale at the southeast side Clinton crossing in Northvale is now part Veteran's Park. The sign at the Lafayette crossing in Harrington Park, indicating the sale of land at the northeast quadtrant, is also gone.

Those Penn Central sale signs have been there for nearly 30 years. I have lived in this area all my life. The West Norwood Station that my father used to commute from was located just north of Blanche Avenue on the west side of the tracks. It burned down in the 70s after Penn Central sold it to the Cuthbertson brothers who owned the shopping center and liquor store across the street. It was later replaced by a strip of stores that includes an Italian Deli and Chinese take-out where I bought some tasty swett and sour pork this evening