Pottstown's New Landmark

With your generosity, history will be made in Pottstown.

With your help, a new landmark will rise in Memorial Park. The Borough of Pottstown and the Colebrookdale Railroad Preservation Trust are partnering to create a monumental edifice within the Park, serving as both a train station connecting passengers with the Park, the regional trail network, Pottsgrove Manor, the recently refurbished early-1900s Pottstown Carousel, and as a community space for our citizens looking to partake in Parks and Recreation classes and events. 
The building will also forward Pottstown's healthy living initiatives, offering a bike share operation and kayak/canoe rentals. The building will enhance Memorial Park’s utility as a regional event space and create a community cultural hub that is currently lacking. The building’s setting and design hearken to the era when Pottstown was a place people were proud to call home.

We have raised over $1.1M dollars from a broad range of sources for this project, with public sources including two counties, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and the federal government, and private sources including foundations, corporations, and individuals, all of whom have affirmed the multiplicative benefits of this people-focused, Pottstown-centric project to the community. But we need your support to help us reach our final goal. 
The building reaffirms Pottstown's identity as a place for building big dreams. Once famous for building the Golden Gate Bridge, the Panama Canal locks, and making Mrs. Smith’s Pies, today Pottstown is working hard to re-invent its post-industrial self. A core part of that strategy is creative placemaking that capitalizes on our unique history, architectural and industrial heritage, cultural diversity, and scenic and geographical beauty. Heritage and culture-based placemaking is a sound investment in a place rich in historic fabric like Pottstown both because it undergirds a tourism-based economy and, more importantly, because it orients and affirms the identity of our people.

No project has led the charge for creative placemaking in Pottstown more boldly than the non-profit Colebrookdale Railroad Preservation Trust working to revive the Civil War railroad corridor linking Pottstown with the Secret Valley to the north. Built by soldiers just home from the Civil War, the Colebrookdale connects our founder’s home, Pottsgrove Manor, with the oldest iron industries in the New World through lands rich in Native American lore. Largely forgotten by time, the Colebrookdale was brought back to life in 2014 and has created jobs and renewed optimism in Pottstown. Each year it brings up to 30,000 people from every state in the nation and multiple foreign nations to Pottstown. Its terminus is in Memorial Park, our community’s recreational and cultural core and a place we see as our best bet for future creative placemaking investments.

Be the change you wish to see in the world. Donate today. 

Want to follow in their good footsteps? Contact us and be a part of the Colebrookdale history. 

We believe fate and good planning has offered a unique opportunity to do something truly transformative for Pottstown. For that, we humbly seek your help. To donate to the Community Recreation Center in the Park or for more information, please contact us here.