Route 66 in the News
Barstow to Sell Historic Harvey House
2005-08-06 09:31:44
BARSTOW, Calif. - Vintage railroad depot: For sale or long-term lease.
For decades, the city has wrestled with the enigma presented by the historic Harvey House.
The 94-year-old Spanish-Mediterranean-style depot, a popular restaurant during the heyday of the railroads, survived the wrecking ball in the 1980s and until recently was Barstow's transit center.
When Greyhound Lines pulled out last year, the Barstow Area Chamber of Commerce moved in to join two museums.
Maintaining the 36,000-square-foot structure drains city coffers for upkeep, utilities and security. It has cost the city $137,000 to operate the Harvey House the past two years, said Patricia Morris, assistant to City Manager Mike Stewart.
After deciding against moving some city offices into the building, and after losing the National Park Service as a potential tenant for its Mojave National Preserve headquarters, city officials have decided to either sell the Harvey House or offer it for a long-term lease.
Laurence Deutsch, president of the Western America Railroad Museum, has advised Stewart that the museum "is interested in discussing the possibility of purchasing the Harvey House."
"As a not-for-profit corporation, we plan to apply for substantial grants to accomplish the purchase," Deutsch said.
To do that, the museum needs a sale price and terms and conditions of a potential sale by the city, he said in a July 7 letter to Stewart.
Mayor Lawrence Dale, vice president of the railroad museum, said the museum will put together a purchase proposal to present to the City Council for review soon.
The railroad museum shares part of the Harvey House with the Route 66 Mother Road Museum and the Chamber of Commerce.
The Harvey House, opened by the Atchison, Topeka Santa Fe Railway in 1911 as a depot and restaurant, closed as a train station in 1973 when air travel overtook rail passenger service. The building had replaced a Harvey House built in 1887 that burned to the ground in 1908.
After a long battle to save the depot from demolition, the city in 1990 bought the 12-acre site surrounding the structure from Santa Fe for $218,400. The railroad donated the building, which the city reopened a year later as a transit center for Amtrak trains, Greyhound and Orange Belt buses, and city cabs and buses.
About $13 million has been invested in the Harvey House, including $10.4 million in federal funds and $1.4 million in redevelopment money.
The old depot has 24,491 square feet of space available for leasing, city officials said. That excludes space occupied by the building's lobby, adjacent dining and lunch rooms, and kitchen.
For the past decade, various groups have looked at the Harvey House as the site for an Indian center, restaurants and retail shops.
~Chuck Mueller, San Bernardino Sun
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