Erie Pavonia terminal in Jersey City

Hello,

Which of the railroad yards shown in the aerial photograph at the following link was the location of the Erie Pavonia terminal at Jersey City?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/59635146@N ... otostream/

Does anyone know if the 1886 Erie Pavonia terminal shown in the illustration at http://www.catskillarchive.com/rrextra/rspav.html survive intact during the 1920s with relatively little changes to the exterior?

When did the exterior of the building get demolished?

Interesting that there are not many pictures online as to what the terminal looked like.

Thank you for your time.

Sincerely,
Walter Conklin

I think it has to be the one in the left foreground with the 3 U-shaped ferry slips extending into the river. The photo seems to date from after the passenger service moved to Hoboken (because of the miscellaneous barges or whatever moored in the space that would have been needed by the ferries) but before the Hoboken ferry ceased operation. I couldn't pull up the second linked photo -- the message said it couldn't be reached by the server.

Hi,

I find it intriguing that there are not many surviving images available of the Erie Pavonia terminal building at least online.

Walter

I don't recall seeing many even in books.

I am pretty sure it is the third one from the left. The leftmost one (mostly out of the photo) is part of the Pennsylvania's Harismus Cove Branch (next to which I lived for a time in the 1960s). The next one is Erie, but not the passenger terminal.

Pavonia Avenue paralleled the south (left) side of the passenger trackage, and you can see it extend west (up) to a small park which would be the junction with Jersey Avenue.

My dad and I would occassionally venture over to that area, back when the PATH Pavonia Station was largely unused-- there was no reason to get off there unless you liked a long walk along Pavonia. Freight cars, including a Johnson Wax car that my father got a slide of, were parked in the former passenger terminal tracks.

From maps of the area when Pavonia existed, I would agree with ExCon90 that it's the one to near left of photo with the U shapes of old ferry slips barely showing.

Here is a picture I have of the terminal in the 1950's. Quality is not great, but it might help.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jckidstuff ... hotostream

Thanks for posting that photo of the Erie terminal! The street in front of it is Pavonia Avenue which will help spot the former terminal site on the image to which the OP referred.

You can imagine how desolate that area looked after the terminal was torn down.

At the very bottom left of the photo is the beginning of a more substantial fence. I think, but I am not sure, that this was the entrance to the Pavonia (Erie) PATH Station.

You'd never know that this was what was once there, looking at the high-rent district that now occupies that entire area.

Here is another picture of the Erie terminal after it was abandoned but before it was torn down. You get a better view of the front of the terminal Note that the tracks are already gone. I don't know the date of the photo.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jckidstuff ... hotostream

Those are the only photos I can remember ever seeing of that terminal. Thanks for posting.

There is a picture of the Pavonia station in use (with steam still backing trains to it) in America's Colorful Railroads by Don Ball (which is long out of print). Yes in this photo the station is gone, it's the first form the left with the barges blocking the three ferry slips.

I think I've seen the pic that bingdude mentions somewere on-line, but where?
I also found this picture of the Erie pavonia terminal: http://njrails.tripod.com/20th_Century/Erie/erie.htm -click on the picture a bit down on the left side to enlarge it. JS

EDIT: here is a picture of steam lined up for the evening commuter rush from Erie terminal: http://www.decodog.com/inven/rr/rr28359.jpg

a few weeks ago there was a bunch of slides/negatives of the demolition of the erie terminal. Now I wish I had bid on them.

Yes very few good photos of the Erie Pavonia Avenue Station and ferry terminal. Virtually none of the interior or the NJ side ferry waiting room. Very strange. I joined the Erie RR Historical Society and they are looking. They had a handful but that's all

Does anyone know what colors the original Pavonia Station in Jersey City was painted? I'm considering commissioning a painting of it for a new book I'm writing on the orphan trains. My paternal grandmother, Emily (Reese) Kidder, was one of the tens of thousands of orphan train riders that passed through the Erie depot on their journey west from New York. She went in March 1906. I'm hoping someone either has a description from a newspaper or magazine. Even a later photo or a memory of what colors the building were would be of interest. Thanks so much for any help you can give me on this.