Hopewell Borough has secured another grant from New Jersey Historic Trust to cover the costs of restoring the Hopewell Railroad Station.
The Borough Council authorized Mayor Ryan Kennedy to execute a grant agreement for the $287,000 state grant at the governing body’s meeting on March 6.
“I want to take my time to thank [Borough Administrator] Doug Walker in particular and the finance team,” the mayor said. “If you recall we received a grant for approximately $250,000 for what we thought would be a $500,000 project.
“With time and further deterioration, the project increased considerably, and we have under Doug’s leadership now identified two additional grants where ultimately a much larger project almost $1 million worth of work is going to be done at taxpayer cost essentially less than our initial estimate of matching the $250,000 grant.”
This is the third grant the borough has received for the restoration project of Hopewell Railroad Station, which is located at Railroad Place.
Hopewell Borough initially received a preservation grant of $250,000 in 2020 from the Preserve New Jersey Historic Preservation Fund, which is under the New Jersey Historic Trust. The fund provides matching grants to historic preservation construction and planning projects.
The borough had a matching share in the Railroad Station project for about $250,000.
In 2020, the Borough Council had unanimously adopted a bond ordinance appropriating the funds for the station improvements that included roof replacement and repairs, gutters, woodworking, painting, carpentry, and brick repainting.
In October 2024, the borough announced that a second grant, close to $147,000, was being awarded from the New Jersey Historic Trust to the borough for the station project.
The New Jersey Historic Trust was created in the 1960s to preserve historic sites across the state and it is currently affiliated with the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs.
The three-story train station on Railroad Place was built in 1876 and is a historic National Register-listed property.
According to the Hopewell Living History project, the train station in the 1940s had between 16 to 20 trains a day. However, the train service declined by the 1960s and was reduced to four trains a day.
All train service was discontinued in 1982. The station and the 4.3-acre property changed owners in the mid-1980s from New Jersey Transit to Bernard Fedor, a private developer. By 1993, the borough acquired the station from Fedor.
In 2001, the station opened as a community center following extensive renovations through federal and state grants of more than $1.2 million.
The borough noted that once the current restoration work is completed community use and special events will be able to take place again at the Railroad Station.
