The Routes Not Taken Page 37

  56. New York Times, January 3, 1956.

  57. New York Herald Tribune, September 23, 1955.

  58. New York Times, September 23, 1955.

  59. New York Times, April 24, 1956.

  60. MacNeil Mitchell served in the New York State legislature for twenty-seven years. He is remembered for legislation written with Assembly Member Alfred A. Lama providing tax abatement and low-interest mortgages for developers and nonprofit organizations building middle-income co-op housing and housing with affordable rentals.

  61. New York Times, January 18, 1957.

  62. New York Times, March 9, 1957.

  63. New York Times, November 26, 1957. This is the first instance I’ve found of plans to make any part of the subway system accessible to the elderly or disabled. Needless to say, the ramps were never built.

  64. New York Times, January 2, 1968.

  65. New York Times, August 13, 1968.

  66. Ibid.

  67. New York Times, May 24, 1969.

  68. New York Times, August 15, 1968.

  69. New York Times, March 5, 1969.

  70. Ibid.

  71. Ibid.

  72. New York Times, June 5, 1969.

  73. Later a member of the MTA Board.

  74. New York Times, June 6, 1969.

  75. New York Times, July 24, 1969.

  76. Of “Hit Sign, Win Suit” at Ebbets Field fame.

  77. Metropolitan Transportation Authority, Public Hearing in the Matter of: Second Avenue Subway, Route 132A, East 34th Street to East 126th Street, Manhattan, September 16, 1971, pp. 51–54.

  78. In 2011 dollars, $134 million.

  79. This was also the sixty-eighth anniversary of the opening of the original subway line.

  80. New York Times, January 21, 1973.

  81. New York Times, February 18, 1973.

  82. Department of City Planning / Municipal Arts Society, Humanizing Subway Entrances: Opportunity on Second Avenue, New York, September 1974, p. 8.

  83. New York Times, July 26, 1974.

  84. New York Times, October 16, 1974.

  85. New York Times, November 1, 1974.

  86. New York Times, November 12, 1974.

  87. New York Times, July 27, 1995.

  88. New York Times, March 12, 1999.

  89. “Public advocate” is the title of the position that has been known in the past as “president of the Board of Aldermen” and “City Council president.”

  90. NY1 News, May 13, 2003.

  10. OTHER PLANS, OTHER LINES, OTHER ISSUES IN THE POSTWAR YEARS

  1. New York Times, November 12, 1946.

  2. Ibid.

  3. New York Times, May 6, 1946.

  4. The Home News itself was fading away, being slowly absorbed by the New York Post. In 1949 the Home News name would disappear.

  5. North Side News, March 25, 1946.

  6. From the text of the speech given by General Gross to the Bronx Board of Trade, reprinted in the April 1946 edition of Bronxboro magazine.

  7. Bronx Home News, August 2, 1946.

  8. New York Post, July 2, 1947.

  9. New York Post, July 30, 1947.

  10. Long Island Star Journal, January 28, 1946.

  11. New York Times, May 30, 1947.

  12. New York Times, November 1, 1947.

  13. Sidney H. Bingham, born in Manhattan, began his career in transit with the IRT in 1915. He worked for the Army Railway Engineers during World War I and gained a degree in electrical engineering from Columbia University in 1922. He worked for the IRT and BOT until World War II, when he played a significant role in logistical planning before and during the Normandy invasion, gaining the rank of colonel. He returned to the BOT after the war, becoming chairman in 1950 and general manager and executive director of the TA. After his retirement in 1953, he spent the rest of his professional career working as a transit-planning consultant.

  14. See Appendix B.

  15. New York Times, March 2, 1948.

  16. New York Times, March 30, 1948.

  17. Letter from William Reid to the members of the Board of Estimate, November 30, 1948. From the New York City Municipal Archives.

  18. Ibid.

  19. Long Island Daily Press, June 24, 1948.

  20. New York Post and Home News, December 6, 1948.

  21. Ibid.

  22. New York Post and Home News, January 25, 1949.

  23. Ibid.

  24. Ibid.

  25. New York Post and Home News, March 25, 1949.

  26. New York World-Telegram, November 5, 1949.

  27. New York Herald Tribune, November 6, 1949.

  28. Brooklyn Eagle, November 4, 1949.

  29. New York Herald Tribune, November 5, 1949.

  30. New York Post, November 6, 1949.

  31. Brooklyn Eagle, June 22, 1949.

  32. Ibid. The right-of-way underneath the line was envisioned as a parking area for beachgoers—then, as now, at a premium—but became one of the few east–west streets on the peninsula, the Rockaway Freeway.

  33. New York Times, June 23, 1949.

  34. Brooklyn Eagle, March 12, 1951.

  35. Brooklyn Eagle, September 19, 1951.

  36. Brooklyn Eagle, May 8, 1950; New York Times, May 9, 1950.

  37. Brooklyn Eagle, May 31, 1950.

  38. New York Times, May 17, 1951.

  39. New York Times, September 11, 1951.

  40. Ibid.

  41. New York Times, September 14, 1951.

  42. Brooklyn Eagle, September 14, 1951.

  43. New York Times, March 4, 1952. The TBTA is now MTA Bridges and Tunnels.

  44. New York Times, March 10, 1952.

  45. New York Herald Tribune, October 9, 1952.

  46. New York Times, October 27, 1952.

  47. Brooklyn Eagle, March 18, 1953.

  48. Brooklyn Eagle, March 21, 1953.

  49. New York Times, March 27, 1953.

  50. General Casey, born in Brooklyn, was a West Point graduate who earned a doctorate in engineering after World War I. He carried out hydropower and flood control projects in the United States and the Philippines and later played a major role in the design of the Pentagon. He was General Douglas MacArthur’s chief engineer at the time of the start of the U.S. involvement in World War II. He was evacuated from the Philippines along with MacArthur and continued to serve as his chief engineer to the end of the war.

  51. New York Times, June 2, 1953.

  52. Brooklyn Eagle, June 17, 1953.

  53. New York Times, July 14, 1953.

  54. Ibid.

  55. New York Times, January 6, 1955.

  56. New York Post, December 19, 1954.

  57. Charles L. Patterson, a native of Pittsburgh, was born into a railroading family. His grandfather was a vice president of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad; his father worked for William Gibbs McAdoo at the Federal Railroad Administration during the First World War. Before coming to the New York City Transit Authority, he worked for the Pennsylvania Railroad, the Long Island Rail Road, the Lehigh Valley Railroad, the Duluth, Mesabi, and Iron Range Railroad, and the Bessamer and Lake Erie Railroad. His passing in 1962 was publicly mourned not only by elected officials and his colleagues in TA management, but by Michael J. Quill and the leadership of the Transport Workers Union as well. His last place of residence was at 205 East 63rd Street, right over one of the subway lines that he would have been trying to build a few years later.

  58. See Chapter 2.

  59. The route that this line would have followed to the East River is unspecified, but based on other BOT plans it probably would have run under East 72nd Street.

  60. New York Times, November 28, 1955.

  61. Now WNBC-TV.

  62. Long Island Daily Press, July 30, 1956.

  63. New York Times, July 30, 1956.

  64. New York Times, July 31, 1956.

  65. New York World Telegram and Sun, July 31, 1956. The Brooklyn Eagle had ceased publication in 1955, and the World Teleg
ram and Sun was trying to fill the void that the Eagle had left in providing coverage to Brooklyn.

  66. Long Island Star-Journal, July 31, 1956.

  67. New York Times, August 3, 1956.

  68. New York World Telegram and Sun, August 2, 1956.

  69. New York Times, July 17, 1957.

  70. The discontinuation of service on the remainder of the Rockaway Beach line gave rise to what was then an innovation in transit service. Green Bus Lines Inc., one of several privately operated bus lines serving Queens, began service on the XQ23 bus line, which ran between Midtown Manhattan and the stations served by that LIRR line. This was the first of what would be many express bus routes in New York City.

  71. New York Times, April 12, 1957.

  72. Ibid.

  73. New York Times, September 4, 1957.

  74. New York Times, September 5, 1957.

  75. New York Times, August 20, 1958.

  76. New York Times, July 15, 1959.

  77. Long Island Star-Journal, January 28, 1961.

  78. New York Times, October 22, 1959.

  79. New York Times, January 8, 1966.

  80. New York Times, July 20, 1962.

  81. Ibid.

  82. New York Times, August 12, 1962.

  83. Merrick Boulevard serves as the trunk route for a number of bus lines in southeastern Queens. This is the only proposal made by a public agency to build a subway line to run along it.

  84. The Atlantic line is now known as the Far Rockaway line.

  85. New York Times, May 3, 1963.

  86. New York Times, July 24, 1963.

  87. New York Times, August 4, 1963.

  88. New York Times, December 28, 1963.

  89. New York Times, February 24, 1964.

  90. Ibid.

  91. New York Times, December 10, 1964.

  92. New York Times, December 16, 1964.

  93. New York Times, January 15, 1965.

  94. New York Times, March 8, 1966.

  95. New York City Department of City Planning, Queens–Long Island Rail Transit: A Transit Strategy for a Growing Metropolitan Corridor, staff report prepared by Joseph McC. Leiper, January 1965, p. 21.

  96. A New Long Island Rail Road: A Report to Nelson A. Rockefeller, Governor of New York, from the Special Committee on the Long Island Rail Road, February, 1965, p. 12.

  97. New York Times, March 9, 1966.

  11. WHAT HAPPENED TO THE REST OF THE SYSTEM?

  1. Peter Derrick, Tunneling to the Future: The Story of the Great Subway Expansion That Saved New York (New York: New York University Press, 2001), 214.

  2. Ibid.

  3. Brooklyn Daily Eagle, October 10, 1921.

  4. Clifton Hood, 722 Miles: The Building of the Subways and How They Transformed New York (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1993), 196.

  5. New York Times, February 8, 1925.

  6. Hood, 722 Miles, 227.

  7. New York Times, October 6, 1921.

  8. New York Times, October 25, 1921.

  9. Charles Garrett, The La Guardia Years (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1961), 211–12.

  10. August R. Heckscher with Phyllis Robinson, When La Guardia Was Mayor (New York: W.W. Norton, 1978), 377.

  11. Ibid., 378.

  APPENDIX B. THE 1947 2ND AVENUE SERVICE PLAN

  1. New York Herald Tribune, December 16, 1947.

  2. Current service—A and C lines.

  3. Current service—B and D lines.

  4. Current service—No. 6 line.

  5. Current service—E, F, M, and R lines.

  6. Current service—R line.

  7. Current service—N line.

  8. Current service—D Line.

  9. Current service—F line.

  10. Current service—B and Q lines.

  11. Current service—L line.

  12. Current service—A and C lines.

  13. Current service—J and Z lines.

  14. Current service—Nos. 2 and 5 lines.

  APPENDIX C. THE CAST OF CHARACTERS

  1. It is expected that the Q line will run along the 2nd Avenue line when it opens. Another route designation will be used for the second route on the Astoria line

  2. All shuttle lines carry the S designation.

  3. This is the line segment from Ozone Park to the Rockaways.

  Bibliography

  Brooks, Michael W. Subway City: Riding Trains, Reading New York. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1997.

  Cudahy, Brian J. Under the Sidewalks of New York: The Story of the World’s Greatest Subway System. Lexington, Mass.: Stephen Greene Press, 1985.

  Dahl, Gerhard M. Transit Truths. New York: Era Publications, 1924.

  Derrick, Peter. Tunneling to the Future: The Story of the Great Subway Expansion That Saved New York. New York: New York University Press, 2001.

  Fein, Michael R., Paving the Way: New York Road Building and the American State, 1880–1956. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2008.

  Fischler, Stan. Uptown, Downtown: A Trip Through Time on New York’s Subways. New York: Hawthorn Books, 1976.

  Fogelson, Robert M. Downtown: Its Rise and Fall, 1880–1950. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2001.

  Garrett, Charles. The LaGuardia Years: Machine and Reform Politics in New York City. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1961.

  Harwood, Herbert H. The New York, Westchester, and Boston Railway: J. P. Morgan’s Magnificent Mistake. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2008.

  Heckscher, August R., and Phyllis Robinson. When LaGuardia Was Mayor: New York’s Legendary Years. New York: W. W. Norton, 1978.

  Hood, Clifton. 722 Miles: The Building of the Subways and How They Transformed New York. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1993.

  Kaplan, Lawrence, and Carol P. Kaplan. Between Ocean and City: The Transformation of Rockaway, New York. New York: Columbia University Press, 2003.

  Kramer, Frederick A. Building the Independent Subway: The Technology and Intense Struggle of New York City’s Most Gigantic Venture. New York: Quadrant Press, 1990.

  ______. Subway to the World’s Fair. Westfield, N.J.: Bells and Whistles, 1991.

  Lewinson, Edwin R. John Purroy Mitchel: The Boy Mayor of New York. New York: Astra Books, 1965.

  Lewis, Harold MacLean. A Concrete Plan for a Better Description of New York’s Commuter Traffic from Westchester. New York: Parsons Brinckerhoff, 1929.

  Malcolm, Tom. William Barclay Parsons: A Renaissance Man of Old New York. New York: Parsons, Brinckerhoff, 2010.

  Queens Planning Commission. Initial Report of Queens Planning Commission. Edited by H. J. Haarmeyer. New York: Queens Planning Commission, 1929.

  ______. Report of Queens Planning Commission. Edited by Leon M. Schoonmaker, assisted by Andrew L. Muller. New York: Tavern Printing Corporation, 1937.

  Thomas, Lately. The Mayor Who Mastered New York: The Life and Opinions of William J. Gaynor. New York: Morrow, 1969.

  Ultan, Lloyd. The Beautiful Bronx, 1920–1950. Westport, Conn.: Arlington House, 1979.

  Walker, James Blaine. Fifty Years of Rapid Transit, 1864–1914. New York: Law Printing Company, 1918.

  William E. Harmon and Company Inc. South New York, Formerly Staten Island: A Booklet Relating to Property for Sale at South New York. New York: Wood, Harmon, 1906.

  ______. Wood-Harmon Magazine (New York). August 1902–January 1918.

  Willis, Walter I. Queens Borough. Brooklyn: Brooklyn Eagle Press, 1913.

  Acknowledgments

  This book is the result of a labor of love that took many years to achieve fruition. I am indebted to a number of people who helped me complete the work.

  It would be wrong for me to not mention first Robert Olmsted and Stephen Dobrow. They both knew far more about the New York City transit system than I could ever aspire to learn. I wish that they were both still here for me to personally express my gratitude to them.

  I owe a great deal of thanks to the faculty of York College and Queens College of
the City University of New York. I gained an appreciation for doing research and learning that I never quite had before, which has served me very well since then. I particularly want to remember Peter Wengert and Edward Rogowsky at York and Carol Brown and David Gurin at Queens.

  If there is one person who was indispensible to making this book a reality, it’s my friend and former neighbor Peter Eisenstadt. He did more than did anyone else to give the whole project focus and push me in the right direction. I also want to thank my colleagues at MTA New York City Transit, Glenn Lunden and Jeffrey Erlitz, for their advice and kind words.

  I can’t say enough about the help that I’ve gotten from the New York Transit Museum and its Archives. Gabrielle Shubert heads one of the great research resources on New York City history—not just transit history—an institution that has been invaluable to me. I particularly want to thank Carey Stumm for all her help.

  Many words of praise are also owed to the staffs of the New York, Queens, and Brooklyn Public Libraries and the Brooklyn and Bronx Historic Societies for their help, despite the ways that I’ve terrorized them over the past two decades or so, looking for more information. Dr. Peter Derrick of the Bronx County Historical Society has also been of major help to me.

  And I must say many words of thanks to my other family, the Division of Government and Community Relations at MTA New York City Transit, for putting up with all my talk about unbuilt subway lines for such a long time. Having gotten all this out of my system in this book, I can finally talk about other things as well.

  And a few more words about my dad, Jack Raskin, whose memories of the Burke Avenue line started me on my trips along New York City’s unbuilt subway lines. He passed away on January 27, 2013, after ninety years and three weeks of a wonderful life that touched countless others. There’s never going to be a time in my life when I won’t be missing him a lot. I wish that he was still here to read this book, but I have the feeling that he’s looking over my shoulder as I type these words.

  Index

  The index that appeared in the print version of this title does not match the pages in your eBook. Please use the search function on your eReading device to search for terms of interest. For your reference, the terms that appear in the print index are listed below.

  Abrams, Robert, 221

  Addonizio, Joseph F., 215

  Agar, John S., 157, 160, 163