Located in the village of Strumyani, near Sandanski in southwest Bulgaria, the old Struma railway station is a small architectural gem that takes you back to another time. The abandoned building with its tall aqueduct and its grassy platforms is worth a visit for anyone interested in the history of rail travel.
The station was built during the interwar period following an architectural tender that was carried out at the time, with the winning design being submitted by German architect Hans Kleinschmidt. The construction was halted at the outbreak of World War II, but the main concrete shell survived the bombing that took place in the early 1940s, and the station remains relatively intact today.
In the 1950s, new additions were made to the station, including engine room workshops and two barns, as well as a fuel depot. In 1970 OSE was founded as the legal successor of the old SEK, taking over responsibility for most of the country’s railway infrastructure. Eventually, passenger traffic dwindled as the state-imposed monopoly on freight transport ended in the early 1990s.
The station is connected to the city of Thessaloniki by a series of public buses operated by the Thessaloniki Urban Transportation Organization (OASTH). Line 78 runs from the Thessaloniki Central Bus Terminal, and from there, passengers can connect with further buses that run to the Macedonia InterCity Bus Terminal in Skopje and to the border crossing with Albania. In addition, the station is served by the twice-daily OSE trains to Sofia.
