The station building includes a public waiting area, concessions, Amtrak and intercity bus ticket counters, and public restrooms. There are also three internal vestibules which can be accessed by users during the time the station is unstaffed and closed for the day. Outside are separate covered waiting areas for Amtrak and intercity bus riders, a bike storage area, a customer pick-up and drop-off area, and 150 long-term parking spaces. The station serves Amtrak's Blue Water train. It also serves three intercity bus services: Greyhound, Indian Trails, and Megabus. Local CATAbus routes 20, 35, 39 stop at the station, and the facility also offers taxicab and bike-sharing. The property also has space on its south end of the site along the CSX Plymouth Subdivision to construct an additional platform for future passenger rail services if needed.
History
Historically, the major railroad depots in the Lansing metropolitan area were the Union Station and the Grand Trunk Western Station, both in Lansing. With the establishment of Amtrak in 1971, both stations lost their train service. Amtrak subsequently took over a building in East Lansing to serve as a station for its planned Blue Water train. This building had been built as a storage facility for Michigan State University in 1971. The Blue Water began servicing this facility on September 15, 1974. The service was renamed the Blue Water Limited on October 26, 1975, and became the International Limited on October 31, 1982, when the eastern terminus was extended to Toronto. The International Limited was operated jointly by Via Rail and Amtrak until it was discontinued in 2004 and replaced with the modern Blue Water line. Plans for the new station complex, the Capital Area Multimodal Gateway, were announced in 2010, and originally included a new parking structure and improved bus facilities as well as bicycle parking. The project was intended to replace the older Amtrak station with updated facilities, and to consolidated rail and bus service into one intermodal transit station. The project was awarded a $6.3 million grant in July 2012 by the U.S. Department of Transportation's Federal Transit Administration, and by then the parking structure had been dropped from the plan. In addition to the construction costs, CATA paid a $3.2 million long-term lease for the site. The station property also included facilities for intercity bus service. Site work began in late July 2014, and included demolition of the old Michigan State UniversitySurplus Store and Printing Services buildings on-site. The original station closed after the last train departed on January 25, 2016, and operations moved to the newly built station located a few yards to the west.
