Alberton Public Library opens in new location
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One of only two railway depots on PEI built of stones, rocks and boulders, the Alberton Depot still serves the town, though no longer as a railway station.
Waymark Code: WMV427
Location: Prince Edward Island, Canada
Date Posted: 02/20/2017
Views: 1
For a few years at least, the Alberton Railway Station will be home to the public library. In 2016 the library was forced out of their building by flooding and associated concerns over air quality. The library landed in the railway depot which had until then been home to the Alberton Visitor Centre. CBC News issued a short story on the move which can be read further below.
This is the second depot to be built in the town of Alberton, the original wood frame station, similar to Georgetown's, having been used from 1875 to 1905. Built in 1904-05, the depot is the handiwork of architect Charles B. Chappell (1857-1931), who also designed many notable buildings in the Maritimes, including Charlottetown City Hall in the city of his birth. The station served as a railway depot until its closing in 1971 then, in 1973, the station was transformed into a tourist information centre and a craft shop, which it remains today.
The depot was built by the Prince Edward Island Railway (PEIR), which was funded by the PEI government and founded in 1871. Construction costs nearly bankrupted the province, which was forced to join Canadian Confederation in order to obtain funds with which to continue construction. The railway ran nearly from end to end of the Island, from Tignish in the west to Elmira in the east, with several spur lines serving major trading areas.
Improvements in the highways system and in the trucking industry lead to a slow decline in revenue for the railway on the Island, eventually leading to the announcement in July, 1989 that abandonment of the railway on Prince Edward Island was imminent. On December 31, 1989, the ferry John Hamilton Gray carried the last operational rail cars and locomotives off Prince Edward Island and the railway became extinct.
Alberton Public Library
opens in new location
Old building closed due to flooding and air quality problems
CBC News Posted: Jan 07, 2016 6:00 AM AT
The Alberton Public Library is back up and running in a new location, the Old Stone Station on Railway Street.
The town's former library was closed for the past eight months because of flooding and problems with air quality.
Alberton library fears closure
Michael Murphy, the mayor of Alberton, says many people in town rely on the library for information and lots more, so he's glad to see it back.
"We have a pretty big population of older people who don't have vehicles and transportation to move around, so I mean it's entertainment for those people," said Murphy. "They get their reading materials, their DVDs, their books, whatever they need."
The town is planning an official opening for the new library, but no date has been confirmed yet.
From CBC News