Wollaston
Wollaston is the only non-renovated red line station (and last one to not have elevators and be ADA compliant) with an island platform for the two subway tracks, and single commuter rail track. The station is on a fairly low embankment with the standard concrete brutalist architecture and canopied middle of the platform. A single staircase/up escalator lead down to a sunken fare control area, whose slightly underground design makes it prone to flooding during rainstorms. This area leads to short staircases back up to street level to leave the station. The east end is a large parking lot with 550 parking spaces. The otherside leads out to a what resembles a street stair to Newport Avenue and local businesses across from where Brook Street ends at a T-Junction.
Wollaston Station Closed for Reconstruction from January 8, 2018, to August 16, 2019:During the 19 month closure (with bus shuttles to North Quincy or Quincy Center) the station was completely rebuilt. This project made the entire Red Line ADA compliant, and also did flood mitigation work. This project gave the station 3 elevators providing two different accessible paths from the street to the platform. Starting at the exit to Newport Avenue, passengers enter via a staircase or a ramp down into the renovated sunken fare control area. From here, beneath the Red Line platform, are sets of faregates on both sides: to the north is just a staircase up to the platform, to the south is an elevator (marked Newport Avenue/Buses) followed by a staircase. This tunnel beneath the tracks and platform continues to a ramp (with a couple steps where the ramp loops around) to a larger enclosed headhouse area at the level of the parking lot. From here is a third set of faregates. These lead to the much longer in terms of walking, but more airy with windows throughout, elevated pedestrian bridge entrance to the platform (that I assume was also built for redundancy in case the original and now rebuilt sunken fare control area floods again). Here a staircase/up escalator and an elevator leads to a fully climate-controlled bridge. This bridge leads across the Inbound track at an angle to a landing where the second elevator down to the platform is (marked drop-off/pick-up), from here the walkway continues about 100 feet above the platform before ending at a combined staircase/up escalator down to the island platform. This complex renovation also rebuilt the station's canopy to be a modern metal canopy (instead of the old concrete canopy) and very few of the station’s brutalist roots remain.
Photos 1-12: June 28, 2011; 13-75: August 2, 2021
North Quincy