 Hammond-Whiting, IN | Wolverine | New Buffalo, MI  |
Michigan City, IN is home to the last Interurban Electric Railway left, the South Shore Line, whose Michigan City-11 Street stop, where trains stop right in the middle of 11 Street on a single track is 10 blocks south of the Amtrak Station. The Amtrak line crosses the South Shore Line track at a level-crossing (going under it's wire) just west of the station. Today (as of November 2016) two of the three daily Wolverine Trains stop at the station while the Blue Water uses the same tracks but bypasses the station.
The Amtrak Station offers a view of both scenery with Lake Michigan viewable from the platform off beyond, and a power plant, the Michigan City Generating Station juts beyond the station along the lake. The stop is located on the Amtrak owned Michigan Line that goes all the way up to Kalamazoo and the grade crossings have Amtrak ownership signs on them. This is longest stretch outside of the NEC owned directly by Amtrak. The historic 1915 depot was sold in 2002 and became Swingbelly's Restaurant and is clearly not a place to wait for a train. I wondered inside to try and wait there on a chilly day and was kicked out immediately. The restaurant does include one interesting piece of railroad memorabilia, a historic New York Central Michigan City sign.
The platform itself has a tactile warning strip that is a pinkish color, two modern format station name signs, an older one that beneath it says to call 1-800-USA-Rail for train information, along with listing incorrect train times. The one form of shelter consists of a plastic bus shelter like so many others that can be found at street corners across the country. This shelter does have a single bench inside of it. There is also the now ADA required wheelchair lift enclosure and a line of red parking lot style lampposts. The platform is set back from a parking lot, a portion of which is flooded and an old pointless arrow sign in it points towards parking or the station (I can't figure out if station means the platform or the actual depot no longer used by the railroad). The platform at its east end is between the grade crossings with Franklin Street where la dolce via ice cream parlor is under construction, and the depot turned restaurant, west of which is the Michigan City Generating Station across the Wabash Street Grade Crossing. Water Street runs on the opposite side of the tracks.
2017 Update: The resturant in the depot has changed hands, the burger place closed, otherwise the station is exactly the same, the platform schedule is still incorrect
Photos 1-40: 27 October, 2011; 41-54: 10 October, 2016; 55-75: 3 June, 2017
