Wellesley Farms

Wellesley Farms is a commuter rail station on the MBTA Commuter Rail Framingham/Worcester Line, located in the Wellesley Farms section of Wellesley, Massachusetts. The current station building, designed by Henry Hobson Richardson in 1886 and constructed in 1890, has been listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places as Wellesley Farms Railroad Station since 1986.With 558 daily boardings in 2013, it is the least-used station on the line outside Route 128, although still around average for stations on the system.HistoryThe Boston & Worcester Railroad (B&W), extending outwards from Boston, reached through the West Parish of Needham in mid-1834. Rice's Crossing station opened as a flag stop north of Glen Road soon afterward. In 1839, the line was double tracked through the area.Wellesley Farms station, which was designed by Henry Hobson Richardson prior to his death in 1886, opened south of Glen Road to replace Rice's Crossing in 1890. Like many B&A stations, it had attractive landscaping; Charles Mulford Robinson called it "unique, and to be remembered" in 1904.The station was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1986. In July 2004, the MBTA closed a paved crossing between the crossings in response to concerns about safety. Similar crossings exist at some other MBTA stations, but the agency's policy is to eliminate grade crossings whenever possible when building or renovating stations.