Qualla: Atlantic City Union Station

Atlantic City Union Station: Introduction

Mon, 01 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Farragutful, CC BY-SA 4.0. Before the Pennsylvania-Reading Seashore Lines existed, two competing railroads ran into Atlantic City - the Pennsylvania Railroad with its West Jersey and Seashore line, and the Reading Railroad with its Atlantic City Railroad. They had separate depots three blocks apart. They duplicated services on the same routes. By the Depression they were both losing money. In 1933 they did what competing American railroads almost never did willingly: they merged their southern New Jersey operations into a single new company, the PRSL, and built a single Union Station to consolidate their Atlantic City passenger operations. The new station opened September 30, 1934, at 2121 Arctic Avenue. It was, for one shining decade, the architecturally finest building of its kind on the New Jersey shore.

Image: Farragutful | CC BY-SA 4.0

Atlantic City Union Station: Rosenstein's Art Deco

Mon, 01 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit User:dtcdthingy 3:30 pm 30th July 2004 (Minolta Dimage X20), Public domain. The architect David A. Rosenstein designed the Union Station in what was then called a modified classic style - a transitional mix of beaux-arts symmetry with art deco surface decoration. The main waiting room was the showpiece: two stories high, 78 feet across, with a coffered c...

Image: User:dtcdthingy 3:30 pm 30th July 2004 (Minolta Dimage X20) | Public domain

Atlantic City Union Station: The Blue Comet and the Nellie Bly

Mon, 01 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Farragutful, CC BY-SA 4.0. Atlantic City Union Station hosted some of the most famous named passenger trains of the late steam era. The Central Railroad of New Jersey's Blue Comet ran from Jersey City to Atlantic City via Lakewood and the Pine Barrens until 1941, painted in the sky blue and silver scheme t...

Image: Farragutful | CC BY-SA 4.0

Atlantic City Union Station: The Expressway Cuts the Tracks

Mon, 01 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Hikki Nagasaki, Public domain. In 1964 the Atlantic City Expressway opened, providing a fast highway from Camden directly to Atlantic City. The Expressway's path into the city crossed the rail line just west of Union Station - and rather than route around the new station, the highway engineers chose to sever t...

Image: Hikki Nagasaki | Public domain

Atlantic City Union Station: The Bus Terminal Years

Mon, 01 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Hikki Nagasaki, Public domain. The Ballinger Company of Philadelphia was hired in late 1964 to convert the disused Union Station into a bus terminal. The five rail platforms were modified to accommodate buses. A metal sign reading ATLANTIC CITY MUNICIPAL BUS TERMINAL was bolted over the original PENNSYLVANIA R...

Image: Hikki Nagasaki | Public domain

Atlantic City Union Station: Demolished for an Outlet Mall

Mon, 01 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit W. Reichmann, CC BY-SA 3.0. In the mid-1990s, Atlantic City planners announced the Gateway Corridor Roadway Improvements - a redevelopment project meant to create a more attractive entry to the city from the Expressway. The plan called for demolishing the old Union Station. The Historic American Buildings S...

Image: W. Reichmann | CC BY-SA 3.0