Fort Worth, TX - Central Station (FTW)

Central Station
1001 Jones Street
Fort Worth, TX 76102

Station Hours

Annual Ticket Revenue (FY 2023): $4,704,301
Annual Station Ridership (FY 2023): 107,566

• Ownerships
• Routes Served
• Contact
• Local Community Links

• Facility Ownership: Fort Worth Transportation Authority
• Parking Lot Ownership: Fort Worth Transportation Authority
• Platform Ownership: Fort Worth Transportation Authority
• Track Ownership: Fort Worth Transportation Authority, BNSF Railway

• Heartland Flyer
• Texas Eagle

Todd Stennis
Regional Contact
governmentaffairsnol@amtrak.com
For information about Amtrak fares and schedules, please visit Amtrak.com or call 1-800-USA-RAIL (1-800-872-7245).

• City of Fort Worth
• Amtrak Texas Eagle
• Heartland Flyer
• Trinity Metro buses
• Trinity Railway Express (TRE) commuter rail
• TEXRail commuter rail

Amtrak is housed in Fort Worth Central Station – known until early 2019 as the Intermodal Transportation Center – which opened to the public in January 2002. Constructed of brick and trimmed in stone, the modern transportation center is also served by Trinity Railway Express (TRE) commuter trains to Dallas; TEXRail commuter trains to Dallas/Forth Worth International Airport; Greyhound and other intercity buses; local Trinity Metro buses; and taxis.

Designed by the Fort Worth architectural firm of Gideon Toal, Central Station pays homage to rail stations of the past in its form and materials. It stands in an area that was once a bustling commercial and warehouse district on the northeast side of the city, near Sundance Square. Its 70-foot high, four-faced clock tower now presents a striking landmark in a section of Fort Worth that was once a center of commerce for the African-American community.

Central Station, built with federal and local funding of $14 million, spans 31,000 square feet. Planning for the station began in the 1990s after studies showed that intermodal transportation facilities would encourage people to use one or more of the services and reduce congestion and pollution. Some earlier plans, made around 1979, called for redevelopment of the former Texas and Pacific Railway (T&P) depot into modern office spaces. Developers wanted federal funding for that project, but were required to demonstrate that it would create a connection point for trains, buses, cars and other transportation modes, a challenge given the T&P depot’s distance south of downtown Fort Worth.

Politicians and downtown leaders successfully moved for Central Station to be built not at the T&P building nor at Union Depot, then used by Amtrak, but at Ninth and Jones streets, closer to downtown employers, Sundance Square, the Botanical and Water Gardens and other city attractions. The inauguration of TRE service at the same time Central Station opened was hailed as a major improvement for the metropolitan area, linking Fort Worth with Dallas by commuter rail for the first time in 67 years.

Visual arts are an integral part of Central Station. As part of its shady breezeway, a five-part mural in clay tiles depicts the history of African-American businesses and life in the neighborhood between 1865 and 1940. Also on display is a restored trolley car from the Crimson Limited interurban railroad that ran between Dallas and Fort Worth. The interurban railcar, operated by the Northern Texas Traction Company, ceased operation in 1934. The shaded courtyard also leads to a life-sized interactive game board designed by local artist Joan Zalenski.

Until Amtrak moved to Central Station in 2002, it had served the Beaux Arts-styled Union Depot, also known as the Santa Fe Depot, since 1971. Constructed of red and buff brick with stone trim, the building opened on March 1, 1899. The architects are unknown, but the builders were David Smith and John Bardon. It features a soaring, two story waiting room with barrel-vaulted ceiling, marble floors and stained glass windows with insets depicting the history of transportation as represented by a covered wagon, Pony Express rider and a steam locomotive. Over the years, Union Depot was used by the Frisco, Rock Island, Burlington, Cotton Belt, Southern Pacific and Santa Fe railroads.

Union Depot was renovated and modernized in 1938 as part of a program undertaken by the Fort Worth Union Passenger Station Company and the Santa Fe. In 1960, the Santa Fe became the sole railroad using the facility, and was later succeeded by Amtrak. The building was placed on the National Register of Historic Places and designated a Recorded Texas Historic Landmark in 1970. Shirlee and Taylor Gandy purchased the depot in 1999. Following Amtrak’s departure, they restored the structure to its original beauty and distinctiveness. Today it functions as a popular meeting and banquet facility.

The T&P built a depot on Lancaster Avenue in the late 1800s and replaced it in 1931 with an extravagant 13-story Zig-Zag-style Art Deco building that would serve as both a passenger depot and office spaces. Wyatt C. Hedrick, with Herman P. Koeppe as designer, planned this monumental railroad complex on the south end of downtown. Even though the exterior is very elaborate, the interior passenger lobby and office building lobbies are even more spectacular. The lobbies, which feature magnificent ceilings, have been fully restored. The former office space has been repurposed into residential lofts. The TRE terminates at this stop, which is west of Central Station.

Major General William Jenkins Worth, who had been second in command to Zachary Taylor in the Mexican-American war, proposed a line of ten forts to mark the Western Texas frontier from Eagle Pass to the confluence of the West Fork and Clear Fork of the Trinity River. Though Worth died of cholera before he saw his plan carried out, his successor named the camp at the confluence of these forks for him when it was established in 1849. After flooding, the fort was moved to the top of the bluff, where the courthouse still stands today. The Army abandoned the fort in 1853, but settlers remained, claiming the area for their own in spite of significant threat from the local Native Americans.

The town began to grow when it became a stop along the legendary Chisholm Trail, where the cattle were driven to market. Post Civil War, though, population dropped until the town was almost extinguished. However, in 1876, the Texas and Pacific Railway arrived in Fort Worth, and population swelled as migrants from the devastated and war-torn South arrived. Fort Worth became the westernmost railhead and transit point for cattle shipment. Local businessman Louville Niles, formed the Forth Worth Stockyards Company in 1893 to take advantage of the city’s business focus of the time, and within two years, the two largest cattle slaughtering firms of the time, Armour and Swift, both established operations in the new stockyard.

Fort Worth has remained important financially for oil exploration companies. In 2007, advances in drilling technology made vast natural gas reserves available in the Barnett Shale under the city. Many residents found they were receiving royalty checks for their mineral rights.

Central Station is close to several notable attractions, including the Fort Worth Water Gardens, the Botanical Gardens, and the Stockyards National Historical District. The Water Gardens, built in 1974 and designed by noted architects Philip Johnson and John Burgee, consists of three focus pools and a knoll, as well as extensive plantings. The Active Pool was built so that people could walk down into it and enjoy the water tumbling all around them.

The Fort Worth Botanical Gardens, established in 1934, are the oldest in the state of Texas. Within it is a 7.5-acre Japanese garden, with most of its structures and plants donated by Fort Worth’s sister city of Nagaoka, Japan, including a meditation garden, a moon viewing deck, a pagoda, and fish-food dispensers to feed the hundreds of koi in the garden’s ponds. Built in the tradition of Edo-period (1600-1868) stroll gardens, the Fort Worth Japanese Garden integrates several styles of garden design into a single landscape.

The Fort Worth Stockyards Historical District was so-designated in 1976, and provides some notable nightclubs and bars. Additionally the district features two daytime cattle drives of Texas Longhorns, reminding all the modern city of today began as a dusty “cowtown.”

The Heartland Flyer is financed primarily through funds made available by the Oklahoma and Texas Departments of Transportation.

Station Building (with waiting room)