Wilkes-Barre's CNJ Station
The Restoration has Begun!Wilkes-Barre's 1868 built CNJ Railroad Depot was initially built for the Lehigh and Susquehanna Railroad. The 1868 two and a half story, brick building with one and one half-story wings on either side came under the Central of New Jersey Railroad's control when that line leased the L&S in 1871. The Victorian style station served passengers until 1963, and finally closed in 1972, after which the tracks were later removed and paved over. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1975.
The station sat unused for some time afterwards - (click here) for an image by Tom Trencansky in 1976. Plans for its reuse and restoration have been made and broken time after time - until now! George Albert, the developer of the historic structure, stated on April 30th, 2021, he set a five-month deadline to complete the project by the end of October to make it ready to be the new home of the Luzerne County tourism office. The tourism office will be on the first floor and the second floor will have private office space. Hadley Construction Inc. of Pittston was the low bidder for the $1.2 million project. Now if we could just have some rail laid down return passenger service return to “The Diamond City”.
