Westham Train Station as it appears today.
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As the building once appeared. The Westham station served as the Richmond Visitor’s Center almost 40 years. This postcard image shows the building, which was surrounded by a transportation exhibit as well as providing information about Richmond for visitors coming off the interstate.
Dr. Danny Avula, Mayor
City of Richmond Virginia
900 East Broad Street, Suite 201
Richmond, VA 23219
Dear Mayor Avula:
First, best wishes for you and your staff for 2025. As we have seen from the recent water crisis in Richmond, problems with this city can spring up in an instant, to add to those passed down by preceding administrations. The latter is the case in the deliberate and calculated deterioration of a City-owned property that you may not be aware of, and I would like to bring this to your attention as time is of the essence.
The former Westham, Virginia train station was built in 1911 and moved by the Richmond Jaycees to its current site at 1710 Robin Hood Road in 1963. It is City of Richmond property, and once served as the City of Richmond Welcome Center for many years before the Welcome Center moved to Downtown Richmond in 2002. Since then, the former train station has been allowed to deteriorate, and the City of Richmond has done virtually nothing to maintain this building in more than 20 years. It is the responsibility of the Economic Development Authority of the City of Richmond, but they clearly have no interest in any other course than let the building fall down and then demolish it.
Mayor Avula, in other cities this kind of building is
celebrated as a local asset, to be utilized and treasured. It is a
building form that is rapidly disappearing from the American landscape.
The evidence of the condition of the former Westham station clearly signals to
visitor and taxpayer alike that City of Richmond has embarked on a program of
demolition by neglect, ironically carried out beside the largest highway artery
on the East Coast for all to see.
The idea that this waste of a cultural and historic resource is being conducted by the City of Richmond itself is especially galling. The City-owned Leigh Street Armory suffered the same indifferent “stewardship” verging on criminal until it was rescued and is now the Black History Museum and Cultural Center of Virginia and is a major tourist draw and considered an architectural gem. If we as a city only had the imagination and the creativity to save this building, too, it would be an amazing asset for Richmond. This is obviously not the case, so I urge you to put an end to the indifference shown by your predecessors and give this building away to some entity who can move it, restore it, and reuse it. Time is critical as the building is rapidly deteriorating.
Sincerely,
Selden Richardson
CC: Matthew Welsh, Acting Director of Economic Development
Here is the contact information for the Mayor: RVAMayor@rva.gov
Contact Matthew Welsh, Acting Director of Economic Development
email: econdev@rva.gov
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