The Quakertown Freight House, a 1902 brick-and-stone landmark that spent three decades rotting in the middle of downtown, just landed a $1 million state grant to finish its transformation into a multi-use event space. State and local officials gathered Wednesday at Doan Distillery, next door to the old rail building at 31 Front Street, to present the Main Street Matters award to the Rail Yard Society, the Quakertown nonprofit leading the restoration.
Key Takeaways
- A $1 million Pennsylvania Main Street Matters grant will fund the next phase of converting the abandoned 1902 Quakertown Freight House into a multi-use event space.
- An emergency state grant already paid for a new standing seam roof last winter, which likely saved the deteriorating building from collapse.
- Quakertown Borough has pledged to run electric, water, sewer and gas to the building and pave the surrounding area as soon as the project is ready.
From Shipping Hub to Eyesore
Built by the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad Company, the Freight House spent most of the twentieth century as a vital regional shipping hub, the working half of the rail complex whose passenger depot still anchors downtown Quakertown. When freight operations wound down, the building was abandoned in the early 1990s. The depot next door was rescued and restored after a severe fire in 1989; the Freight House got no such second chance and spent the next 30 years deteriorating in plain sight.
Borough Manager Scott McElree remembers exactly what that looked like when he arrived in Quakertown 22 years ago, back when the East Penn Railroad used the building for rail car maintenance on tracks leased from SEPTA. “Needless to say, it was a haven for drug use,” McElree said. “It was also a haven for rodents and those kinds of negative elements. It had laid dormant for a long period of time.”
The Rescue Plan
The turnaround began when the Rail Yard Society, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit dedicated to restoring historic infrastructure in and around Quakertown, took on the project under board president and local developer Chris LaBonge. The group’s portfolio already includes the Trolley Barn Public Market and the Eagle Hotel, and its plan for the Freight House is to turn the cavernous interior into a modern event destination while preserving the building’s industrial bones…