(rshsdepot) Benson Street - Glen Ridge, NJ

[Bernie Wagenblast <brwagenblast_@_comcast.net>]

He wants to restore service on commuter line

By Joseph A. Gambardello
Philadelphia Inquirer Staff Writer

PASSAIC, N.J. - To say that Jim Wilson has railroading in his blood is to
state the obvious.

From shining shoes at Glen Ridge's Benson Street station in North Jersey
when he was a boy to working for the Erie Lackawanna, Conrail, NJ Transit
and Amtrak, and even owning his own short line, Wilson's life has long been
coupled to trains.

Taking that relationship a step further, Wilson wants to do something that
railroads stopped doing and handed over to the government in the 1970s:
provide regularly scheduled passenger rail service.

Now, we're not talking about a major intercity connection. What Wilson wants
to do is restore commuter service between Hoboken and three North Jersey
stations that NJ Transit has given up on.

"There's no job too big for a small railroad," joked Wilson, whose New York
& Greenwood Lake Railway delivers freight on a 2.5-mile line between Passaic
and Garfield.

Service to the stations - Benson Street, Rowe Street in Bloomfield, and
Arlington in Kearny - ended in September when NJ Transit opened a $63
million connection between the Boonton Line and the Montclair Branch,
allowing Boonton Line passengers to take trains directly into Manhattan.

The three stations, on a section of the Boonton Line south of the
connection, served about 800 commuters daily, Wilson said.

He has gone to court - along with Bloomfield, Kearny, and a group of
passengers - in a bid to at least allow Wilson to make a pitch at a public
hearing for what he wants to do.

Their argument: NJ Transit did not hold public hearings on discontinuing
service. NJ Transit has countered that its policies allowed it to cancel
service without hearings because it is providing an alternative service,
shuttle buses from the stations to other connections. Judge Thomas Olivieri
of Superior Court in Hudson County is scheduled to hear arguments Jan. 10.

Spokeswoman Penny Bassett Hackett said NJ Transit would not comment while
the case was in litigation.

But Kearny resident Michael D'Isa said the shuttle bus had added an hour to
his daily commute into Manhattan via the PATH train from Hoboken.

He said he would support the efforts of anyone - be it Wilson or someone
else - to restore service to his station.

"As long as somebody does it," the record company executive said. "After
all, the tracks are there."

For Wilson, 52, of Glen Ridge, ending service on the Boonton Line also was
somewhat personal.

Since the 1960s, he has been the semiofficial stationmaster at the Benson
Street station.

It started when the Erie Lackawanna stopped selling tickets at the station
and the stationmaster gave the young Wilson a key to the building to store
his shoeshine box. Wilson took it upon himself to open up the station for
commuters every morning.

In time, he started paying a small rent and still does, using the station as
his office for the freight operation.

After a stint in the Marine Corps, he went to work for the Erie Lackawanna
and became a conductor.

Sitting the other day in the lounge of the Chestnut Hill, a private railcar
he hopes to use in his proposed passenger run, Wilson recalled how he would
open Benson Street in the morning and then head off to Dover for his first
run into Hoboken.

"It was always good to be with the people," he said. "Now kids of people I
knew are taking the train."

Five years ago, after a career that exposed him to other parts of the rail
business, Wilson started the New York & Greenwood Lake Railway. The name is
rich in symbolism: It was the original railroad on the Boonton Line.

Wilson said that when NJ Transit announced plans to close the three
stations, some commuters asked him to explore the possibility of providing
alternative service.

He accepted the challenge and produced a brochure promoting the effort.

But NJ Transit said Wilson had not shown he could run a passenger line.

Wilson relishes being something of a nuisance to NJ Transit. During the
interview aboard his private car, he noted that he had sat through an NJ
Transit board meeting the day before just to remind transportation officials
that he had not gone away.

"It's tough bringing a state agency to court," he said. "Talk about fighting
city hall, and we've got two city halls fighting with us."

"But I love it," Wilson said. "I actually enjoy it. Without the controversy,
I don't know what I would have."


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The Railroad Station Historical Society maintains a database of existing
railroad structures at: http://www.rrshs.org

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