The Kensington Railway Station is a National Historic Site of Canada, located in the town of Kensington, Prince Edward Island. The train station was the third built at the site, and one of two "boulder stations" built by Charles Benjamin Chappell in 1904, so named for the fieldstone composing its exterior walls.
Passenger service to the station was terminated in 1969, and in 1985 the site was purchased by the town of Kensington. In 1990, diesel locomotive Engine 1762 was moved to the site from Summerside for permanent display. The building has been restored and renovated, and has been used for various purposes, including as a library and tourist information centre. It is currently used as a restaurant.
Background
In 1871, Prince Edward Island undertook a railway project to connect Georgetown in the east with Alberton in the west. The project greatly increased its debt, which provided impetus for the colony of British North America to evaluate several options, eventually joining Canadian Confederation on 1 July 1873 under the Prince Edward Island Terms of Union.
The earliest station building in Kensington did not have living quarters, making it inadequate for the town. It was a structure with a ticket office and waiting room, and also had freight storage facilities.
The Prince Edward Island Railway station was replaced in 1878 by a mansard-roofed station building, but could not satisfy the demands placed upon it. In 1904, architect Charles Benjamin Chappell was hired to design a new station building, the same year he designed the railway station in Alberton. The construction company M.F. Schurman and Company was hired to build it. Facilities for processing freight were located north of the station building.
In 1906, the second station building was moved to Imperial Street, where it became the station master residence. That building is still in use. The new station building was opened on 20 December 1905.
Description
The station building has a frontage of and is constructed from fieldstone obtained from western Prince County and New Brunswick. This stone represented the bulk of the $5,000 cost of the building, was arranged by shape, and was affixed with stucco.
It is a rectangular building with a steeply pitched cross-gable roof, the ends of which are decorated in Tudor style. At the north and south ends of the building, the canopy terminates as a hip roof. The roof overhangs the east and west ends of the building, which provided passengers with shade from the sun and shelter from the rain.
Stone columns support the porticos on each side, and there are sheltered platforms at each gable end. The protruding bay with the arch window was used by the telegraph operator.
Panelling in the office consisted of North Carolina pine and ash, the latter also used to panel the waiting rooms at either end of the station. Hardwood floors were installed throughout the building. The waiting rooms were originally segregated, with a smoking room for men and a non-smoking room for women. These were later transformed for local and express trains.
The site also included a freight shed built in 1906, which was a building to store freight for shipment, and a number of other warehouses owned by local businesses. A flower garden with concrete lettering spelling the town's name was once installed at the site, but had been removed no later than the 1970s. Near the station are various craft shops.
National Historic Site
On 15 June 1976, the Kensington Railway Station was declared a National Historic Site of Canada. The site was purchased by the town of Kensington in 1985 for restoration. A conservation project restored the site in 1999. It was designated a provincial heritage place under the Heritage Places Protection Act in March 2015, along with five other properties: Emerald Railway Station, O’Leary Railway Station, Lyle House (Birch Hill), St. Anne's Church (in Lennox Island), and the West River Petroglyph Site in Bonshaw.
Engine 1762
Near the station building is Engine 1762, a diesel locomotive which had been used by Canadian National Railway on the island's railway system. The locomotive had been obtained by Summerside resident Lowell Huestis, who with the assistance of the Summerside Chamber of Commerce moved the 125-ton locomotive from the Canadian National Railway rail yard to a property near his home. After painting it black, he contacted the Kensington Area Chamber of Commerce to propose moving the locomotive to a permanent location in Kensington.