Topside
Alan and I made our way up to Main Street and walked over to the bridge over the railway, with views back toward the kudzu valley. On the bridge was a sign for a public hearing. I couldn’t tell if it was for the space below, or what.
The opposing balconies looked like there might have been more to them. They certainly didn’t connect to create another buried space because they didn’t quite match up. The beams didn’t match, and they were at different levels.
The north balcony had an elaborate side entrance with a keystone arch. It made us wonder about the original purpose of the building.
The building on the other side of the bridge that covered the tracks on that side looked quite unimpressive. In fact, it looked downright boring.
On the other side of the street we found the bridge we’d seen from below. The back of the plain building on Main Street was occupied by an attorney’s office and a real estate office, but just below that were the passenger doors we had seen earlier.
The parking lot covering the tracks was a mystery. When and why was it constructed? We walked to the end toward McDuffie Street.
On the other side of the street we found the abandoned building we had seen from track level. We took a peek inside, but didn’t explore further.
We wandered back across the street and visited the Carolina Wren Park. This is a sunken park and just about the level of the tracks with a fountain wall. It looks fairly new.
We returned to the car, but I had lots of questions. Was this a passenger depot? When was it active? What was the purpose of the gray building? When and why was the area covered with a parking lot?
When I come across a mystery like this I like to imagine a time when it was active and at its peak. When was that time? What was it really like? I knew I’d be doing lots more research.
Continued on the next page…
Your photography is spectacular!! Thank you so much for sharing!
Tom,
Once again, I stumbled across one of your posts that I found fascinating. Thanks so much for writing about this! I found out about the tunnel a couple of years ago, when my kid was attending Anderson University and he told me about exploring it with some friends. I finally went to check it out a couple of months ago, and had a lot of questions about the history of it. Thank you for all the research and photos.
as a teen there was a Barber Shop (N.Main close to track overhead.)called Rada’s that you went down steps to get to .One day I was walking tracks under the Main Street area and back then there were steps leading up to the platform, I came to a door and open and found myself in his barber shop. He looked at me and said that door should have been locked! SO, I guess in times past this was the way to get down to train station if the Train had came thru Anderson as once planned. I do remember there was still a large buggie you pushed on platform for load and unload luggage. Some said in those days that the County Council didn’t want a train coming thew Anderson to Atlanta.It ended going thru Seneca instead.
I am very interested in the railroad cut history in Anderson and preservation of information with regard to it. I assume you are the author of the presentation about Underground Anderson in Random Connections and would like to be able to get directly in touch with you. I would appreciate it if you could give me an email address and/or telephone number and possibly any other information about your background.
Thank you for the work you have done. I will look forward to hearing from you.
What was the white brick building back in day it’s right next to the bridge? really close to Earl Street Café