Jersey Avenue station

Jersey Avenue is a New Jersey Transit station on the Northeast Corridor Line in New Brunswick, New Jersey. It is near Jersey Avenue, in an industrial area next to a New Jersey Transit rail yard. Unlike all other stations on the NJ Transit Northeast Corridor Line, Jersey Avenue has low-level platforms (the rest are elevated), and, since there is no wheelchair ramp, it is the only station on the line that is not handicapped-accessible. Jersey Avenue opened in October 1963 as part of an experimental park and ride program.

Jersey Avenue has a different layout than most New Jersey Transit stations. It has two platforms: a southbound platform on the main line for trains heading south toward Trenton Transit Center, and a northbound platform on a siding behind the southbound platform for trains heading north toward New York Penn Station. The platforms are separated by a parking lot. There is no platform on the northbound main line, so northbound trains from Trenton cannot serve Jersey Avenue. About a third of the southbound trains that stop at Jersey Avenue do terminate there, using the siding.

In April 2014 NJT approved a contract for a design for relocation and rebuilding the station platform to permit high-level boarding, along with pedestrian overpass, vertical circulation, improved parking, and bus connection areas, as well as improvements to 5 miles of the existing Delco freight line to make it a 130 kilometers per hour (80 miles per hour) main line track for passenger trains. As of 2015, additional design and engineering work to reconfigure the station was funded, but no construction date had been scheduled.

History
The conception of the Jersey Avenue station dates back to July 16, 1963, when officials for the Pennsylvania Railroad and then-governor Richard J. Hughes broke ground on a new station and freight depot along the line by the Tri-State Transportation Committee. The new station was started as an 18-month experiment done by the committee to provide people with access from the railroad to their cars in a new park and ride. The station cost $256,185 (1963 USD) and supplemented the New Brunswick station 1.5 mi north on Albany, Wall and Easton Streets. The new station, slated to open in October, was to be funded by grants from the state and federal governments, and was the inception for a new mass transit system. The station opened October 24, 1963.

Station layout
The station has two low-level side platforms, one of which serves southbound NJ Transit trains at all times. Northbound trains originate from the siding track on weekdays; other northbound NJ Transit trains originating south of this station do not stop here. About a third of the southbound trains that stop at the station terminate on the siding track. Amtrak's Northeast Corridor lines bypass the station via the inner tracks.