Roslindale Village Station

Arborwayfan wrote:But in that case, why not cut out bigger building lots? Maybe the original builders of the line thought they might want more tracks in the future so they made a provision for that with wider abutments, but the tracks were never needed so never built.

The ROW appears to be the normal width for a railroad, around 60 feet or so.

Perhaps the reason for the unusually wide abutment there is to keep people going between the station and the west side of Roberts St from climbing the embankment and crossing over the street on the railroad bridge?

The aerial view in the website provided by F-line clearly (?) shows the long abutment with addition granite support for two more tracks, a total of four. I may be wrong, but it looks like you can also see where the ROW is graded wider behind the Greek Orthodox Church (which used to be Allen Furniture), wide enough to support up to four tracks. Today it is so overgrown it is hard to visualize when standing on the mini-high and looking over Robert St. Space for additional tracks also appears in the valuation maps between the tracks as shown and Fairview Street. In both the aerial view and the maps, I cannot see far enough South to see where the wider ROW begins. The question is whether there were ever four tracks here at all. Maybe they were planned but never constructed.

There IS an explanation,
the ROW was originally 4 tracks from FH to the junction where the W. Roxbury - Dedham line took off from the Needham Br.
It makes sense if trains from Boston were running direct to Dedham Ctr via the W. Rox.
It's hard to tell how many tracks were still there in '38 from the Hist. Aerials imagery, but there were definitely TWO tracks from Dedham Ctr to the junction with the Needham Br.