FREEPORT – A special public ceremony next month will celebrate the beginning of the Amtrak Downeaster train service to Freeport and Brunswick.

According to Edward Bonney, the chairman of the Freeport Train Station Committee, the first day of service, Nov. 1, will be limited to a ceremonial train that will carry invited guests from Boston to Brunswick. The train will stop at the Freeport station on Depot Street at approximately 1 p.m. for a public event to welcome Amtrak to town as invited guests and the media make their way up from Boston on the inaugural run of the expanded service to Brunswick.

The welcoming ceremony will last approximately 45 minutes. Bonney will be speaking to welcome the Downeaster to town and Freeport Town Council Chairman Jim Cassida will speak at the event, as well. The public will also hear from representatives from Amtrak and the Northern New England Passenger Rail Authority, which will be running the service between Boston and Brunswick.

Besides the speeches, there will be music, as the Freeport High School band has been asked to play. There will also be opportunities for the public to win one of several door prizes, which include travel packages between Freeport and Boston and a hotel stay.

After the last free T-shirt has been given out on Nov. 1, the regular service to Freeport will begin for all passengers on Friday, Nov. 2. The first southbound train from Boston will leave from Freeport at 7:20 a.m. and will arrive at Boston’s North Station at 10:30 a.m. The first train northbound from Boston will depart North Station at 9:05 a.m. and arrives in Freeport at 12:15 p.m. before continuing on to Brunswick.

A train will also depart Freeport heading to Boston at 6:05 p.m. each day, arriving in Boston at 9:15 p.m. The final northbound train between Boston and Freeport will leave North Station at 5 p.m. and will pull into Freeport at 8:45 p.m.

The train will make two other runs through Freeport each day as the train is repositioned between Portland and Brunswick at the beginning and end of each day. The train will leave Portland at 6 a.m. each day, passing through Freeport at 6:30 a.m. as it is moved to Brunswick for the initial run to Boston. At the end of the day, the train will pass through Freeport at 8:45 p.m. on weekdays and 9:25 p.m. on weekends and holidays as crews move the train to Portland for the night.

According to Bonney, those two runs are primarily equipment moves between Portland and Brunswick, as there are no facilities to hold trains overnight in Brunswick. Passengers will be allowed on those runs, though the trains will operate on a “flag stop” basis, meaning if there are no passengers on the train waiting to get off in Freeport and no passengers visible on the platform, the train will not stop at the station. Instead, it will pass by the platform before continuing to its destination.