I agree with above explanations.

The first parsing is correct. The secend is possible only for sentences like this：“他说，在我面前的火车站坐车可以去中国。”

Please note two things here.

First, 告诉 is very close in meaning and usage to the English word 'tell'. Its general usage is to tell somebody something. And we use 'say' when the person to be told does not appear.

Second, the phrase 前头有一个车站 indicates that the station is not “right in front of me”. It means there is a station in front. It may or may not be seen from the point where the dialog is taking place. Othervise, in Chinese it should be “前面那个车站” in Chinese.

Third, the Chinese words “前头” is different from the word “面前”. The former can only be interpreted as "in front" and the later is "in front of me". The mistake came as you misplaced 'me' here.