Circa 1865, the Anglo American Telegraph Company set up a repeater station in Avondale. In 1881, the
Newfoundland Railway conducted a survey of the land and planning preparations were started for constructing a railway out to Harbour Grace, in which Salmon Cove was seen as a convenient place for a station. The extant building, a two-storey Second Empire style building with an attached warehouse,. Upon completion of the main railway line in 1898, the
Reid Newfoundland Company took over the existing railway. It was used as a passenger and freight station. In 1923 the Newfoundland Government took over the railway with the 1923 Railway Settlement Act, where the Government acquired the railway, coastal bats, and dry dock from the Reid Newfoundland Company for $2 million. The Avondale Railway Station then became a part of the Newfoundland Railway once again. In 1931 it was finalized for the post offices and telegraph stations to be managed by Newfoundland Railway agents; the Avondale office was taken over on December 15.
The Canadian National Railway took over from the Newfoundland Railway in 1949 when Newfoundland joined the Canadian Confederation. The Avondale Railway Station was managed by CN until 1984. The rails were sold for scrap and the rolling stock was retired, scrapped, or sold. They had not received any sort of reply to their application until workers came to tear up the tracks. The people of the community decided they would protest the removal of the tracks, by sitting on them as trucks and bulldozers moved around them. Determination won in the end and the Avondale Railway Station came to an agreement to officially keep a small part of the tracks. The Avondale railway station was designated a Registered Heritage Structure by the
Heritage Foundation of Newfoundland and Labrador in 1988. It was subsequently restored, and received the Manning Award for the “Public Presentation of Historic Places in Newfoundland and Labrador.” As of 2025, it was preserved along with a small display of retired railway cars and a locomotive. == Demographics ==