Bay Street (NJT station)

Bay Street
The station at Bay Street in February 2015.
Location	43 Glenridge Avenue Montclair, New Jersey 07042
Coordinates	40°48′28″N 74°12′32″W / 40.8079°N 74.2089°W / 40.8079; -74.2089Coordinates: 40°48′28″N 74°12′32″W / 40.8079°N 74.2089°W / 40.8079; -74.2089
Owned by	New Jersey Transit
Line(s)	Montclair-Boonton Line
Platforms	2 high-level side platforms
Tracks	2
Connections	NJT Bus: 11, 28, and 29 DeCamp: 33 Montclair Jitney
Construction
Parking	Parking garage of 248 spaces
Bicycle facilities	Bike racks
Disabled access	Yes
Other information
Fare zone	5
History
Opened	February 27, 1981[1]
Rebuilt	2002
Electrified	1981
Traffic
Passengers (2012)	1,288 (average weekday)[2]
Services
Preceding station   NJ Transit Rail   Following station Walnut Street toward Hackettstown Montclair-Boonton Line Glen Ridge toward Hoboken or New York Penn Station

Bay Street Station is a New Jersey Transit station on Pine Street between Bloomfield and Glenridge Avenues in Montclair, New Jersey, along the Montclair-Boonton Line. The station is served by all trains on the line, including all ten weekend trains. The first station of six in Montclair, Bay Street is the southernmost, servicing the downtown district. The station was built originally in 1981 to replace the Lackawanna Terminal built near Grove Street in 1913 as a part of creating the Montclair Connection. Upon its opening on February 27, 1981, Bay Street was a lone platform with a single shelter. In 2002, as part of the Montclair Connection, Bay Street was completely rebuilt to standards for handicapped persons, including two high-level platforms and a new elevator for a bridge crossing the tracks. The station also received honors in July 2010 for the development around the station and as a result was a part of getting Montclair designated a transit village by the New Jersey Department of Transportation.

Station layout and services

Bay Street station is the first of six stations in the township of Montclair, located on Pine Street between Bloomfield Avenue (County Route 506) and Glenridge Avenue. The station has two high-level platforms to serve passengers on its two tracks. The platforms themselves are connected by a crossover bridge with elevators. Ticket vending machines have been recently installed at the station to sell tickets and because of this, passengers who wish to buy a ticket aboard the train must pay an extra $5 in addition to the actual fare for the ticket.^[3] Bay Street station has a 248-space parking garage, and a smaller lot a block away. Eight of those spots are handicapped accessible and are maintained by the Montclair Parking Authority. People who use this station's parking garage must pay $5 a day and $300 for six months to park. This does not apply on Sundays however, when parking is free. There are continuing maintenance issues regarding the station and parking deck, and neither NJ Transit nor the municipality admit responsibility for the station building.^[4]

Bay Street station platform, facing southward from Glenridge Avenue

Bay Street station is a major stop on the Montclair-Boonton Line, serving 32 trains on a daily basis. These include 21 departures to New York's Pennsylvania Station and eleven departures to Hoboken Terminal. Heading outbound from Penn Station and Hoboken Terminal, Bay Street also serves three departures to Hackettstown, three departures to Lake Hopatcong, four departures to Dover, two departures to Mount Olive and 23 departures to Montclair State University Station at Little Falls. Arriving trains include 22 from Penn Station, 13 from Hoboken, 24 from Montclair State University, two from Hackettstown, three from Mount Olive, two from Lake Hopatcong and one from Denville. Weekend service on the Montclair-Boonton also terminates here except on special holiday trains, in which cars go to Lake Hopatcong station.^[5] Regular weekend service runs ten times daily, serving Bay Street along with Glen Ridge, Bloomfield, Watsessing Avenue and Newark Broad Street Station before heading to Hoboken.^[5]

New Jersey Transit also runs several bus routes near or at Bay Street station. The #11, which runs between Newark and Wayne, along with the #28 between Newark and Montclair State University, and the #29 to between Newark to Parsippany or West Caldwell along (Bloomfield Avenue).^[5] The township of Montclair operates a jitney on weekday evenings from Bay Street station to South Mountain Avenue at Bloomfield Avenue. The jitney costs $1.50 and monthly passes are available for riders.^[6]

History

The old Lackawanna Station, now a shopping center

Opening

The station was built in 1981 to replace Montclair's previous station, Lackawanna Plaza, two blocks to the west of the current station. Lackawanna Plaza (also known as Lackawanna Terminal) was once the grand terminal opened in 1913 by the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad for its Montclair Branch.^[7] The station's usage had been relegated from six tracks served by three platforms to one platform serving one station and the branch had gone from two tracks down to one. The station last served passenger trains in February 26, 1981, and the next day, trains,^[1] then operated by Conrail, were realigned to the east in Montclair, serving a new station, named Bay Street. At that time, Bay Street was originally a bare platform with only one track and a small shelter. The realignment was the first phase for the planned Montclair Connection to connect the Montclair Branch to the Boonton Line. This station now served as the terminus of the Montclair Branch, and as a result, the end of electrification.^[8]

Montclair Connection

The new track built for the Montclair Connection, viewed from Bay Street Station

A long sought connection of train service between the Lackawanna Railroad's Montclair Branch and the Erie Railroad's New York and Greenwood Lake Railroad, which serviced five other stations in Montclair was first proposed in 1929 by the Regional Plan Association. However, the Great Depression shelved any plans to connect the lines. The plan continued to wane for several years until in 1963, when the old Boonton Branch was reconfigured at Mountain View in Wayne, New Jersey to the New York and Greenwood Lake, when revival plans returned. However, the connection continued to be a quiet subject until the late 1980s, when New Jersey Transit revived the proposal. A deal was struck with the township of Montclair in 1998, with a one track connection used for only diesel train sets. However, this proposal was changed into a double track connection with overhead electric catenary wires. Construction on the Montclair Connection began one year later and was completed on September 30, 2002.^[8]

As a result of the Montclair Connection, Bay Street station was reconstructed entirely. The lone single platform was removed, rebuilt with two high-level platforms and a large crossover bridge. The shelter was removed and service was expanded full-time in both directions. Rather than being a terminal for trains, trains continued northward to Montclair Heights, where passengers could transfer to other trains.^[9]

Transit village

On July 11, 2010, it was announced by the New Jersey Department of Transportation that Montclair, along with Somerville, had been designated as transit villages. These transit villages are designated to provide residents and people public transit with public services including new residences and stores. Montclair was given high regard for the work done at Bay Street station to make it possible, including a new parking deck, and a complex of seven residential units along Pine Street. These transit villages would also be given a chance to get $100,000 in funding to continue the station's development. Although Montclair's transit village is mostly built at Bay Street, the township also serves five other stations, all in walkable distance from residences.^[10]

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Bay Street (NJT station).

• NJT rail station information page for Bay Street
• DepartureVision real time train information for Bay Street
• Montclair-Boonton Line schedule
• Station from Glenridge Avenue from Google Maps Street View