The Järvelä railway station ( fi, Järvelän rautatieasema, sv, Järvelä järnvägsstation) is located in Kärkölä,

Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...

, in the municipal seat and urban area of

Järvelä Järvelä is a Finnish surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Arto Järvelä (born 1964), Finnish composer and fiddler * Jonne Järvelä (born 1974), Finnish guitarist and singer * Maija Järvelä, Finnish biathlonist * Mauno Järve ...

. It is located along the Riihimäki–

Lahti Lahti (; sv, Lahtis) is a city and municipality in Finland. It is the capital of the region of Päijänne Tavastia (Päijät-Häme) and its growing region is one of the main economic hubs of Finland. Lahti is situated on a bay at the southern e ...

line, and its neighboring stations are

Lappila Lappila is a village of Kärkölä municipality in Päijänne Tavastia, Finland. Its population is about 600. The village is located along the Riihimäki–Lahti railway, along which VR's regional trains stop at Lappila railway station. From the ...

in the west and Herrala in the east.

History

Järvelä is one of the original stations of the Riihimäki–Saint Petersburg railway, and was placed on the crossing of the railway and the road between

Mäntsälä Mäntsälä () is a municipality in the province of Southern Finland, and is part of the Uusimaa region. It has a population of () and covers an area of of which is water. The population density is . The municipality is unilingually Finnish. M ...

and the church village of Kärkölä. The class III station building was constructed according to plans from

Knut Nylander Knut (Norwegian and Swedish), Knud (Danish), or Knútur (Icelandic) is a Scandinavian, German, and Dutch first name, of which the anglicised form is Canute. In Germany both "Knut" and "Knud" are used. In Spanish and Portuguese Canuto is used whi ...

and was later expanded upon twice, in the 1870s and with an additional western wing, designed by

Bruno Granholm Bruno Ferdinand Granholm (May 14, 1857 in Myrskylä – September 29, 1930) was a Finnish architect. He served as the chief architect of Rautatiehallitus (The Railroad Board) between 1892 and 1926. Many of the station buildings he designed are ...

, in 1900. Järvelä quickly began to develop with the arrival of the railway and subsequent industry, and took the place of the municipal seat from the Kärkölä church village in the 1930s. In 1960, Järvelä was home to 1,100 inhabitants; by 2000, the number had increased to 2,800. As of 2018, the population of Järvelä is 2,654. The Koskisen Oy sawmill started operating right by the station in 1931; as of 2020, the sawmill and its

plywood Plywood is a material manufactured from thin layers or "plies" of wood veneer that are glued together with adjacent layers having their wood grain rotated up to 90 degrees to one another. It is an engineered wood from the family of manufactured ...

factory are still active, providing the bulk of the jobs in the municipality. The Koskisen factories regularly receive wood deliveries by rail from

Kouvola Kouvola () is a cities of Finland, city and Municipalities of Finland, municipality in southeastern Finland. It is located along the Kymijoki, Kymijoki River in the Regions of Finland, region of Kymenlaakso, kilometers east of Lahti, west of Lapp ...

. On 18 October 1961, the Railway Administration made the decision to purchase a set of 800 concrete sleepers from abroad, the first of their kind in Finland; in July 1962, they were installed on the section of track between Lappila and Järvelä. The trials were successful, and on 12 June 1963, the first batch of concrete sleepers from Finnish manufacturers was ordered. Järvelä became an unmanned station in 1997, and the station building was sold to a private buyer in 2003. Among the stations on the Riihimäki-Lahti line, Järvelä is an anomaly in that both its passenger and freight transport services continue to operate to this day.

Services

Järvleä is an intermediate station on commuter rail line on the route Riihimäki–

. Westbound trains towards Riihimäki stop at track 1 and eastbound ones towards Lahti use track 2. Prior to the opening of the Kerava-Lahti railway line, Järvelä was also served by the unnamed regional trains on the route Helsinki–Riihimäki–Lahti–

– Kotka Harbour.

References

Kärkölä Knut Nylander railway stations Railway stations opened in 1869 Railway stations in Päijät-Häme {{Finland-railstation-stub