Historical Karaagaç Train Station
Until 1971, Edirne Station was the former main train station of TCDD, located in Karaağaç Town of Edirne city center. The first station on the Istanbul-Sirkeci - Pythio railway was built by the Chemins de fer Orientaux / Rumeli Railway (CO) Company for the Rumeli Railway line and was put into service on April 4, 1873. The second station was completed in 1914, but was put into service in 1930. After the new Edirne Station, built on the Pehlivanköy - Svilengrad railway, came into service on May 23, 1971, the station was closed on October 4, 1971. The building, which served as the Rectorate Building of Trakya University between 1998-2017, has been used as the Faculty of Fine Arts of the same university since 2017. After the first station, which was put into service on April 4, 1873, it was decided to build a larger station. The new station building was again built by Architect Kemaleddin in a neoclassical style. The station building, which is one of the most important stations of the railway connecting Istanbul to Europe, is a three-storey, rectangular structure and 80 m long, built on the model of Sirkeci Station. The construction of the station building was generally completed in 1914, but the station could not be put into service because the railway route changed due to the First World War that started that year. The station remained outside the borders of the Ottoman Empire at the end of the war. After the War of Independence, in accordance with the Treaty of Lausanne signed on July 24, 1923, the town of Karaağaç and the village of Bosnia were returned to Turkey as war compensation in return for the damage done by Greece in Western Anatolia, and the station was returned to Turkey on September 14, 1923. It came under his control. The station, which was reopened in 1930, became a railway exclave -independent of the Turkish railway system- since the part of the railway line operated by the Rumeli Railway (now Alexandroupoli - Svilengrad railway) between Uzunköprü and Karaağaç remained within the borders of Greece. He had to pass through the borders of Greece to reach Edirne from Istanbul. After this process, which lasted about 50 years, on May 23, 1971, the new Edirne Station, built on the Pehlivanköy - Svilengrad railway, was put into service, and the station was closed on October 4, 1971 and its tracks were dismantled. The station building, located very close to the Turkey-Greece border, served as an outpost during the Cyprus Operation in 1974. The building, which was newly established in 1977 and allocated to the Edirne Engineering and Architecture Academy, which forms the basis of today's Trakya University, was restored by the university in accordance with its original form and started to serve as the Rectorate Building of the university in 1998. In the same year, the Lausanne Monument representing the Treaty of Lausanne was built in its garden, and one of the additional station buildings was put into service as the Lausanne Museum. Upon the relocation of the Rectorate Building in 2017, the building started to be used as the Faculty of Fine Arts.
