What's Here:
Union Station
State Street Station
CSX's Cedar Hill Yard (Formerly NH/PC/Conrail)
Metro North Maintenance Facility
Shoreline Trolley Museum
Amtrak
Amtrak's Hartford Line (A 62 mile long "commuter line" going from New Haven to
Springfield MA)
CSX
Providence & Worcester
Metro North New Haven Line
CTrail Shore Line East
Data:
GPS Coordinates: as needed
Phone A/C: 203
ZIP: 06511+
Access by train/transit:
Amtrak and Metro North
Geography:
Hilly
The Scoop:
New Haven, the namesake of the New Haven Railroad, is still a good place to
railfan despite the fact that the New Haven is no longer with us.
The main attraction in New Haven for most of us is probably Union Station.
Here you can find Amtrak and Metro-North.
From the station platforms, you can see the MN maintenance facility just
south of the station.
New Haven being the north end of Metro North service from New York City, they have a
huge maintenance facility adjacent to and just south of Union Station.
There is a second station on the NEC less than a mile north of Union
Station: State Street Station. A few Northeast regional trains stop
here, and well as Shore Line and Hartford Line trains. It is closer
to downtown New Haven, so it is popular with commuters. This is the
north end of Metro North service.
Freight-wise, New Haven is served by CSX and the Providence and Worcester.
Between the passenger trains of Amtrak, Metro North,
CTrail Shore Line, the Hartford Line; the freights; the Shoreline Trolley museum; and the
nearby (kinda) Essex Steam Train, there is plenty to keep one busy for a couple of days.
Other RR's like the CT Southern and the New England Central
are close by, see below in Nearby Railroad Towns.
Cedar Hill yard, NE of the station, is still around, but not used as much as it once was.
More info below.
Not too far away, in East Haven, is the Shoreline Trolley museum. If
you're into trolleys, this is a great museum, and they have a beautiful 1.3
mile ride that goes thru the East Haven Marsh Wildlife Area - a very
different and relaxing ride. They also have my favorite NYC subway car
on their roster, an R-33 that used to run on the IRT #7 "Worlds Fair" line.
Acknowledgements:
University of Connecticut for assembling New Haven track maps
all the way down into New York City, the link is
here
Google Maps
Bing Maps, Birds Eye aerial views
Open Railway Map
Wikipedia
New Haven is at the junction of I-95 and I-91.
I-95 is the gateway from south and north of here along the coast, all the
way to Florida if you want. I-91 starts/end here, and heads up to
Hartford CT (~40mi), Springfield MA (~65mi), Brattleboro VT (~110mi), and
finally the Canadian border at North Derby VT (~280mi). From there,
you are about 90 miles from Montreal via 55 and 10
GPS Coordinates:
50 Union Avenue
Station code: NHV
Union Station is a beautiful station, and is the main transportation hub in New Haven serving all Acela trains,
most Northeast Regional trains and the Vermonter.
It was built in 1920 by the New York, New Haven and Hartford RR, aka the New Haven.
It was refurbished 1979-85 as part of the Northeast Corridor Improvement Project.
and connections to the Hartford Line, Shore Line East, and Metro-North.
Containing over 90 pieces of equipment, they have one of the larger
collections in the U.S., and it all starts for the visitor at the end of
River Street in East Haven.
The start of the trolley ride, and the visitors center,
is at the yellow arrow. I haven't been to New Haven since the Quality
Inn was razed and replaced, and they moved the trolley out front, but it appears that they moved that trolley to
the house across from the visitors center judging from
the aerial views. Google's Streetview camera has not been there recently
enough for pictures, so we can't get a close-up look yet, unless someone wants
to send me pictures.
The blue arrow points to their shop complex.
The orange arrow points to the trolley barns. The green arrow is pointing at the end of the line. Further below is a closer look
at the shops.
NYCTA IRT LO V #5466 and R-9 #1689, March 2025, photo by James Jimmy Harris via Facebook
5/2024, Alan Zelazo via FB
My favorite car in their collection, but I spent my summers growing up a block away from the #7 Line in Jackson Heights on 69th Street! :-)
They should have repainted it in World's Fair livery if they were going to
repaint it from a Redbird.
Cedar Hill yard, NE of the station, is still around, but not used as much as it once was. More info used to be at
www.kinglyheirs.com/AbandonedRR/CedarHill1.html, but it no longer seems to be with us. SO. I resurrected what I
could, and now have the page on my website elsewhere at
www.railfanguides.us/ct/cedarhill/index.htm.
This is in here because it's hard to beat their parking lot for great shots of NB trains
coming into New Haven, and I've never been chased from there (of course,
it's been 25 years since I've been there :-)
This part of the east coast is just SO jam-packed with railroad stuff to
check out, it will take many days to check it all out! For instance:
North of New Haven via I-91 we have:
-- Hartford CT, about ~35 miles away.
-- Hartford has one of Mark Twain's homes, and makes for a nice tour.
-- Just north of Hartford's Bradley airport exit 45, is the Connecticut Trolley Museum at Warehouse Point.
-- North of Hartford is Springfield MA (about 60 miles north), which is the home to
Peter Pan Bus Lines, and they have a
massive depot. Springfield also has a unique railroad station,
where the entrance is "downstairs" and the tracks are above,
but it's not elevated as you may think. Gotta see it to understand.
Via I-95 going north, you have these towns that are fairly close:
-- Essex (~33mi),
-- The Valley Railroad just north of Essex CT,
-- Old Saybrook Junction (~28mi),
-- New London (~43mi), home of the Groton Sub Base and museum,
Amtrak station, and railroad bridge over the Thames River.
New London has an Amtrak station (NLC). It's not only "on the water",
but is on one heck of a S-curve leading to the Thames River bridge! Most Amtrak Northeast
Regional trains and all CT Rail Shore Line East commuter rail trains stop here.
There is a small swing bridge over the entrance to Shaw Cove.
On the west coast of the Thames River, the New England
Central, a Genesee & Wyoming RR (G&W), comes into town and
joins up with the NEC. The other end is up in Vermont, and goes to
St. Albans. They have some beautiful photo spots in southern Vermont!
The NEC Thames River Bridge leads to Groton CT, where trains meet up with a wye
and Amtrak trains continue to Boston.
On the Groton (east) side of the Thames River, the Providence &
Worcester, another G&W railroad, comes down from Worcester MA and joins
the NEC mainline via a wye. It used to be the Norwich & Worcester RR.
It runs thru the Groton Sub Base. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norwich_and_Worcester_Railroad
In the middle of that wye is the former NH Groton Interlocking Tower.
The hotel at this location is no longer a Quality Inn, in fact, it looks like they
tore down the old hotel and Hilton built a brand new one! So I moved this "sight"
down to the Floobydust section since it is of historical value only. Darn.
Disclaimers:
New format 10/26/23: Please check out my disclaimer page for my standard
dribble and contact info here
Union Station
State Street Station
Shoreline Trolley Museum
5/2024, Alan Zelazo via FB
Metro North Shops
Cedar Hill Yard
New Haven Fire Department - Regional Fire Training Academy
