SEPTA, Philly get money for Wayne Junction station

Under a decaying ceiling in the ticket office, next to peeling paint and not far from a collapsed roof, SEPTA and local officials collected $4 million from the Obama administration on Thursday to help rebuild the 110-year-old Wayne Junction rail station in Germantown.

Federal Transit Administrator Peter Rogoff handed over a mock check for $3.98 million, saying the Wayne Junction project was "long, long overdue."

"To attract new riders, transit needs to be clean, safe, reliable, and desirable," Rogoff said. The dilapidated Wayne Junction station, once a stop for the Reading Co.'s Crusader train to New York City and the Baltimore & Ohio's Royal Blue express to Washington, is none of the four. Windows are boarded up, the north entrance is closed because of a fallen roof, pedestrian tunnels are awash in rainwater, and stairs and facades are crumbling.

Ancient signs still direct passengers to trains for Bethlehem, Pa., and New York, destinations that have not been served in 30 years.

SEPTA will start construction late this year on a $30 million project to rebuild Wayne Junction, with elevators, high-level platforms, restored passenger tunnels and stairways, new lighting and signage, and a new heating and cooling system.

Wayne Junction, which is a hub for five SEPTA Regional Rail lines, two bus routes, and one trackless trolley line, serves more than 190,500 riders a year.

Rogoff said the Wayne Junction reconstruction is the type of project the Obama administration wants to see more of. He said the FTA's "state of good repair" budget for fixing existing facilities is proposed to increase by 300 percent in the next budget year, even as money for building new projects is frozen or eliminated.

"We're making a very aggressive statement with this budget," Rogoff said in an interview. He said repairing and rebuilding existing transit facilities was vital if public transit is to attract motorists beset by high gasoline prices.

"My hope would be to bring members [of Congress] to stations like this one," he said. "If we're going to hold onto riders and attract new riders, we need to reinvest in our core assets."

The Wayne Junction project was one of 22 projects cut by SEPTA after state capital funding was cut by 25 percent last year. But with the federal cash and $23 million in borrowed money, the agency resurrected the project this year and hopes to complete construction by 2014.

Rogoff was joined at Thursday's ceremony by U.S. Rep. Chaka Fattah (D., Pa.), State Sen. Shirley Kitchen (D., Phila.), and SEPTA general manager Joseph Casey.