Revisiting: Trenton Edition

The author just moved to Philadelphia yesterday. I visited a few new POs along the way and revisited two facilities that have been covered in this blog and recently discontinued: Trenton's Yardville Branch and Chambersburg Station. Thought there might be some nice new urban renewal projects or delis opening up in these shuttered POs. Let's see what we found:

Yardville; three months after discontinuance: Nothing. In fact, its lease expires March 31, 2013, so this spot will be doing absolutely nothing for the community other than looking abandoned for some time to come. The sign on the door defers people to Trenton's Main Post Office. Driving distance: 2.5 miles.
Chambersburg; 1.5 months after discontinuance: Nothing. Guess when their lease expires: 9/30/2018. In essence, a poor community that has been told they're not worth USPS's while, and they'll probably have to sit with this empty lot for seven long years. They have to find transportation to the Independence Station P.O., 2.1 miles away. There are two other, busier offices, at a similar proximity.

DPO'd: Trenton Edition

Two Trenton post offices have officially hit the chopping block. Anticipating this I took a trip down to visit both of them last week. (I had a couple of days off work, so why not?)

The Yardville Branch post office will close May 20. This is disappointing because the clerk there is appreciative of philately and had plenty of commemorative stamps on-hand. She was proud of her assortment. My apologies to the next customer who might have wanted the new Civil War stamp issue -- I bought her out.

The Mercerville post office, which is listed as an alternate location to Yardville and which I also visited, had DISGRACEFULLY long lines. Other customers during my 20-minute wait informed me that such was commonplace. At the very least it could use that clerk from Yardville for reinforcement.

Here is the Yardville post office:


Trenton's Chambersburg Station, which will close July 1, is located in a low-wealth neighborhood though it appeared to be well used. The clerk there was very nice and even had a brand new postmark dater. Ultimately it's just another one-person post office that seems to be seen as "disposable".