Along with various Webster Groves stations, the Kirkwood railroad station served generations of commuters to downtown and other locations. It still serves as an Amtrak station.
The architecture is interesting, best described as influenced by Romanesque architecture with some Shingle Style elements, particularly on the tower.
The surrounding buildings are all occupied; while they are not grand in scale, they are perfectly fine for their surroundings.
In what could only be described as a triumph of good planning, the sweeping asphalt wasteland of an old Target was ripped out and replaced with actual buildings on the street line. What a crazy idea!
Even if architecturally they are no amazing, they still get the job done: creating an urban and walkable environment in downtown Kirkwood.
Here is the street along the railroad tracks from a different angle.
A neat feature of the station is that, like the outside, the interior remains virtually the same as it was in my boyhood days there in the 1940’s. There are still two “card tables” with inlaid checkers boards.
The construction cost quite a bit more than was anticipated by the RR, as marshy ground was encountered and some very deep piers (word?) had to be sunk into the ground. It worked, as there has been no signs of settling for 120 years, despite the VERY heavy building and the vibration caused by literally millions of heavy trains over the years. Even now, at least 52 trains per day pass by this station – that’s almost 19000 per year!