Seaboard Coastline Building

Seaboard Coastline Building, also known as Old City Hall, is a historic train station located at Portsmouth, Virginia. The original section was built in 1894-1895 by the Seaboard Air Line Railroad. It is a six-story brick and concrete structure, with the 4th and 5th floors added in 1914. The front facade features a distinctive half-round or semicylindrical profile intended to recall the imagery of the streamlined locomotives of the late-19th century. The building served as the northern terminus and office headquarters of the Seaboard Air Line until 1958.^[3]

Seaboard Coastline Building
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
Virginia Landmarks Register
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Location	1 High St., Portsmouth, Virginia
Coordinates	36°50′5″N 76°17′49″W
Area	0.8 acres (0.32 ha)
Built	1894 (1894)-1895, 1914
Built by	Seaboard Air Line Railway
NRHP reference No.	85003129[1]
VLR No.	124-0053
Significant dates
Added to NRHP	October 10, 1985
Designated VLR	August 13, 1985[2]

Passenger train terminal

The terminal as a passenger station, circa 1920

The station served multiple passenger trains daily. One train was the Portsmouth section of the SAL's full service Silver Comet, bound for Raleigh, North Carolina, Athens and Atlanta in Georgia and Birmingham, Alabama. Another train, #3-11 southbound/#6-10 northbound, was a coach-only train to Atlanta, making local stops along the way.^[4] The Silver Comet had its last trip into the station in 1968, when the SAL's successor, the merged Seaboard Coast Line, terminated passenger service on the branch leading into Portsmouth.^[5][6]

Use in recent years

After the building was used for railroad purposes, it was used as the municipal building until 1980.^[3] It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1985.^[1]