Howard station (LIRR)

Howard
A subway train near the former station site in 1973
General information
Location	Hawtree Creek Howard Beach, Queens, New York
Line(s)	Rockaway Beach Branch
Platforms	2 side platforms (1 added later)
Tracks	2
History
Opened	1898
Closed	1907
Electrified	July 26, 1905
Former services
Preceding station Long Island Rail Road Following station Hamilton Beach toward Glendale Rockaway Beach Division Goose Creek toward Gibson or Rockaway Park

Howard (also Howard's Landing) was a former Long Island Rail Road station on the Rockaway Beach Branch. Located on marshland along the coast of Jamaica Bay south of the "WD Tower" near Hawtree Creek, it had no fixed address, and was south of what is today 165th Avenue, evidently within the Gateway National Recreation Area's Hamilton Beach Park.

History

Howard station was originally built in 1898 by the New York and Rockaway Beach Railroad for a hotel and resort built by William H. Howard. The station contained a single plank walk platform over the water along the southbound tracks. Northbound train passengers had to step down into southbound track and walk through southbound cars before entering the hotel. The single platform was extended "several hundred feet" in April 1899, and was given a footpath almost a half-mile long in the Spring of 1900. This included a 34-foot drawbridge that was hand operated and blocked the mouth of Hawtree Creek, much to the dismay of many boaters and fisherman.

A woman who wasn't familiar with the arrangement of the platforms drowned in 1901, when she tried to step off a northbound train at night during high tide and was swept into Jamaica Bay. A northbound platform was added to the station in May 1902. On October 23, 1907, the entire resort including the station was destroyed in a fire. It was never rebuilt.

External links

• Electrification of Rockaway Beach Branch from Ozone Park to Hammels Wye