Fredericton youth organizes petition to preserve historic York Street train station

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Canadaeast News Service

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FREDERICTON - A Fredericton teen is stepping up to the plate in hopes of preserving a crumbling relic of the city's past.

Murray Yeomans, a 15-year-old Leo Hayes High School student, has collected about 300 signatures for a petition to save the York Street train station. He says he plans to submit the document today to city council members. Yeomans says he spent hours researching the history of the 84-year-old structure and has a new appreciation for the station's cultural significance. He says he'd hate it come to an end with a wrecking ball.

"Every time I've driven by the train station I thought, 'Somebody just needs to do something about this,'" he says. "It's part of our heritage, it's a huge piece of railway history and it played a huge role in keeping Fredericton to the rest of the nation. So in my eyes, if the station was never built, Fredericton might not be the city it is today."

The Grade 10 student says the vast majority of those who signed his petition were high school students. Yeomans says that shows many youths care deeply about issues that affect the community.