Cambridge Springs station

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Cambridge Springs station was a historic Erie Railroad stop in Cambridge Springs, Pennsylvania, on the Main Line Meadville Division between Salamanca, New York, and Meadville, Pennsylvania. The site sits about 501 miles from Manhattan and 480 miles from Hoboken.

The station opened on October 27, 1862, when the Atlantic and Great Western Railroad reached Meadville, making Cambridge Springs a real stop on the line. The depot stood at 302 Venango Avenue. For many years, trains passed through the town as part of a busy main line.

A trolley line connected Cambridge Springs with Meadville and Erie. The Meadville Street Railway opened a Cambridge-Edinboro-Meadville route in the late 1890s, with service reaching Erie by 1900–1903. In 1912, the trolley system merged into Northwestern Pennsylvania Railway.

Cambridge Springs was also known for its mineral springs and attracted visitors for the spa. In 1904 the town hosted the Cambridge Springs International Chess Congress, sponsored by the Erie Railroad at Rider Hotel; the event was won by Frank Marshall and drew players from the United States and Europe.

In 1919 the Northwestern Pennsylvania Railway was sold to the Erie Trust Company and later became part of Northwestern Electric. Bus service began in 1925, and trolley service declined, ending in 1928. The Erie Railroad continued to run through Cambridge Springs, but the era of major through trains faded in the mid-20th century, especially after the Erie-Lackawanna merger.

The Cambridge Springs depot at Venango Avenue was demolished in 1964 to make way for a new Cambridge Springs Volunteer Fire Department building. The nearby Northwestern Pennsylvania Railway station remains, and the old trolley station was preserved and reopened as a museum in 2017.

Passenger service through Cambridge Springs ended on August 1, 1965, when the Erie-Lackawanna canceled its through trains. A marble monument at 501.2 miles from New York marked the halfway point between New York City and Chicago, a historic nod to the station’s place on the route.

The site had one side platform and two tracks, and today it is remembered as a key chapter in the region’s railway and railway-related leisure history.