If you’re a Gold Line rider who travels through the Foothills, you may have noticed the ongoing construction taking place next to Monrovia Station as developers renovate the historic Santa Fe Depot. The depot, built in 1926 and closed in 1972, has been sitting vacant for decades.
But soon all that green fencing will be coming down!
Check out the video above to see some of the work that’s been done so far. All of the metal works, tiles and columns are restored originals, while the former train platform is set to become outdoor dining space. The renovation work is scheduled for completion by the end of the year, and a restaurant — not publicly identified yet — is slated to move in and open this coming spring.
The Santa Fe Depot is adjacent to Station Square Park, which includes a playground and amphitheatre. The park opened in 2016 at the same time as the Gold Line Foothill Extension. The depot is also across the street from a new 261-unit apartment building called MODA that is currently under construction.
Once the depot is reopened, the Monrovia Station Square Transit Village will be a great place to have a meal, explore, enjoy some music or relax. And it will be super convenient to Gold Line riders.
Related: The Gem City blog also has some great before/after pics of the depot.
Categories: Policy & Funding, Projects
Maybe this development makes this area, another place for people in Monrovia to go to? Not sure what is on the other two corners, but with the station on one corner and the apartment complex on another, and assuming the other two corners get redeveloped/developed this gives people other options besides going to Old Town Monrovia.
Hi,
That’s the idea! The park has a bandshell for concerts and small performances, and there’s also a brewery on the other side of the Santa Fe Depot. The southern corners are currently occupied by a recycling center and car wash, but as I understand it the city is hoping to redevelop that area in the near future with art/retail/dining space.
Anna Chen
Writer, The Source
Looks good. Too bad, though, it’s a mile south of Old Town Monrovia, with the 210 and its busy on- and off-ramps between the two areas. Not a pleasant or pededstrian friendly area to walk through with all that traffic. If we want more people to get around on foot through public transit, we’re gonna have to think about these things and find a way for the trains to become an option as competitive as the automobile. The L.A. transportation system still has a lot of holes in it. Thanks to the auto and tire industries from 70-some years ago, L.A. became a sprawling mess. If only the train companies and local government back then were more persistent, that even as more and more people were buying cars and those industries were becoming a dominating force, they could have continued to maintain and develop the train/subway system. The mindset should be “this is for the good of the city, of the community, for the future”. Now Metro is having to play catch-up for all those years the car-mindset became ingrained in L.A.’s transportation culture.
Monrovia now has an amazing opportunity to fill the gap!
Very cool how the depot is coming full circle! This is shaping up to be a nice little area.
I was confused by how three rows of tables could fit on a 15-foot wide train platform, and assumed these were tiny people. But the blog you linked clearly shows that they completely demolished the old platform, then built something much wider that looks like an old train platform. Historic preservation must have only applied to the building itself.
Future diners will wonder why train platforms in old times were so wide, and why they are much narrower in modern times.