Port Washington station

Port Washington is the terminus of the Long Island Rail Road's Port Washington Branch in Port Washington, New York. The station is located on Main Street, between Haven Avenue and South Bayles Avenue, just west of Port Washington Boulevard (NY 101), and is 19.9 miles (32 km) from Pennsylvania Station in Midtown Manhattan. A pedestrian bridge exists between the platforms, and is in line with Franklin Avenue, ending at Haven Avenue.

History
The construction of a train station in Port Washington was first recommended to Austin Corbin by a group of Port Washington residents in 1895, after a failed attempt to extend the existing North Side Division between Great Neck and Roslyn in 1882. Efforts to bring rail service to the community actually date back to the days of the Flushing and North Side Railroad which established an unbuilt subsidiary called the "North Shore and Port Washington Railroad" that was dissolved once the F&NS was consolidated into the Flushing, North Shore and Central Railroad in 1874. The station was originally built on June 23, 1898 by the Great Neck and Port Washington Railroad, an LIRR subsidiary that existed between 1898 and 1902.

The Port Washington Branch was electrified to Port Washington in 1913. The station was remodeled in 1930, and again in 1998 upon the station's 100th Anniversary.

In 1959, the main parking lot at the station was opened by the Port Washington Parking District, with a capacity of 411 cars. Parking capacity for the station more than doubled when the district opened the parking lot. The construction of this parking lot required the Town of North Hempstead and the Long Island Rail Road to make land swaps, and the station's rail freight depot was relocated roughly 0.5 mi to make rooms for the improved parking facilities.

In April 2014, a pedestrian bridge connecting the south end of the station with Haven Avenue closed, after pieces of concrete fell off the bridge and onto the tracks. Determined to be structurally-unsound, corroded, and largely damaged beyond repair, the overpass was demolished, and the station's other pedestrian overpass received a temporary, prefabricated extension span to maintain the pedestrian connection between Haven Avenue and the south end of the station.

In 2018, then-New York State Senator Elaine R. Philips secured a $5 million grant to replace the platform canopies at the station.

In order to allow for increased service via the line to Grand Central Terminal after the completion of East Side Access, two existing tracks in the Port Washington Yard (located at the station) are planned to be extended to accommodate two additional ten-car trains. Work was originally scheduled to begin in January 2018 and be completed by December 2020. , construction was scheduled to commence between late 2020 and early 2021, with a cost of $500,000. However, the project has been met with significant community opposition, primarily because of the proposed reduction in the number of parking spaces at the station. As of September 2022, the MTA and the Town of North Hempstead have not yet reached a final agreement upon construction plans, though the LIRR was nonetheless able to add several trains per day on the branch following the February 2023 completion of East Side Access.

Station layout
This station has two 10-car long island platforms serving four tracks. The remaining four tracks make up the Port Washington Yard and are used for train storage.

Port Washington Yard
The Port Washington Yard is a rail yard in Port Washington, New York, located at the Port Washington Long Island Rail Road station – the terminus of the Port Washington Branch. The yard consists of four tracks – three on the east side of the station and one on the west side. It can accommodate up to 40 train cars at a time.

Proposed expansion
In order to allow for increased service on the Port Washington Branch, two existing tracks in the Port Washington Yard are planned be extended to accommodate two additional ten-car trains. Work was originally scheduled to begin in January 2018 and be completed by December 2020. , construction was scheduled to commence between late 2020 and early 2021, with a cost of $500,000. However, the project has been met with significant community opposition – in large part due to the proposed reduction in the number of parking spaces at the station. While, as of September 2022, the MTA and the Town of North Hempstead have not yet reached a final agreement upon construction plans – although that month, both the LIRR and the Town of North Hempstead reached an agreement that the yard expansion is necessary, and that it, therefore, needs to be built.

Incidents

 * On August 3, 1946, a head-on train crash at the station resulted in two deaths and 27 injuries.
 * On October 14, 1947, the rear car of a New York-bound train backing into the station crashed into the bumper block at approximately 8:12 AM. The train subsequently derailed and crashed into the rear of the station building, ultimately coming to a stop inside the station's waiting room. One person – a 46-year-old, female passenger named Elizabeth Sandblom who had been waiting on the platform – received non-fatal injuries.
 * On December 29, 1988, a 10-car M3 train arriving from Penn Station derailed after crashing into the bumper block at the end of Track 3 at approximately 1:30 PM. The force of the impact caused the train to push the bumper block back by approximately 1 ft; this resulted in the train and bumper block crashing into – and damaging – sections of the track, concrete platform, and the platform's steel railing. At the time of the incident, the train was carrying 25 passengers and four crew members – none of whom were injured. Car # 9892 – the lead car – sustained minor damage in the incident.