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TheNEW YORK DIVISION BULLETIN - DECEMBER, 2005 Bulletin New York Division, Electric Railroaders’ Association Vol. 48, No. 12 December, 2005 The Bulletin IRT CITY HALL STATION CLOSED 60 YEARS AGO Published by the New City Hall station, IRT Lexington Avenue sized near the edges with green and brown York Division, Electric Line, was closed on December 31, 1945. glazed tiles. Three of the vaults have leaded Railroaders’ Association, Incorporated, PO Box Trains still operate around the loop, but gen- glass skylights, which opened upwards to 3001, New York, New erally do not carry passengers. This station is vault lights in City Hall Park, like the skylight York 10008-3001. the most unusual in the transit system. The in the control room. Additional lighting is sup- crews on 6 trains and a few other employ- plied by twelve chandeliers hung from the For general inquiries, ees (along with the occasional railfan or lost center of the vaults, and incandescent bulbs contact us at nydiv@ tourist) are the only ones who can see this near the platform entrance and in the control electricrailroaders.org or interesting architecture as the train proceeds room. There are three glazed terra cotta by phone at (212) 986- at eleven miles per hour around the sharp name plates on the platform walls. 4482 (voice mail available). ERA’s curve. The loop under City Hall Park was the first website is This station and all the other Contract One part of Section 1 that was excavated. This www.electricrailroaders. stations were designed by George L. Heins portion was a concrete arch structure, 11 feet org. and Christopher Grant LaFarge, who were wide and 14 feet 10 inches high. The excava- tion was open cut except for the portion un- Editorial Staff: appointed Consulting Architects on March 7, Editor-in-Chief: 1901 at a fee of $2,500 per annum plus dis- der the vaults of the Post Office building and Bernard Linder bursements. They were educated at the ar- the ten-story New York Times building. Tun- News Editor: chitectural school of the Massachusetts Insti- nels were dug below these buildings. The Randy Glucksman entire excavation for the loop was in soft, Contributing Editor: tute of Technology, the first school of archi- Jeffrey Erlitz tecture in the United States, opened in 1868. loamy sand, which was removed by hand- Although they are remembered as ecclesias- shoveling. Production Manager: tical architects, they also designed numerous City Hall and several other Contracts 1 and David Ross 2 stations were located on curves. Gap fillers homes and secular buildings during their partnership from 1886 until Heins died in were eventually installed at most of the 1907. curved stations, but they were never installed Because the City Hall station is on a sharp at City Hall, which has one of the sharpest curves. curve of a single-track line, it is unique. This ©2005 New York station, designed by Heins and LaFarge, fea- The doors were at the ends of the original Division, Electric tured two short stairways leading from the cars. Conductors, who were on duty in every Railroaders’ street to a vaulted control room. A wide stair- car, were able to remind the passengers that Association, there was a gap between the cars and the Incorporated way led to the platform. The floor and wain- scot were finished similarly to the other sub- platform. When center doors were installed, In This Issue: way stations. The curve of the platform was they were controlled by separate levers and were not opened at City Hall. We do not Eighth Avenue accentuated by a series of timbrel vaults fur- nished by the R. Guastovino Company. know how the doors were controlled when Subway - These vaults were constructed of thin terra the cars were converted to MUDC in 1936. History cotta tiles bonded with a string mortar and The station was closed on December 31, ...Page 2 added in layers to form a thin, strong struc- 1945 after only 230,240 fares were collected tural vault. The vaults in the City Hall station for the year ending June 30, 1945. are made of white matte finish tiles, empha- (Continued on page 18) 1 NEWNEW YORK YORK DIVISION DIVISION BULLETIN BULLETIN - DECEMBER,OCTOBER, 2000 2005 EIGHTH AVENUE SUBWAY by Bernard Linder We have finally completed our histories and track The Rosoff Subway Construction Company built the plans of the IRT and BMT lines. We will begin our IND following portions of the IND: history in this issue. Trains were still overcrowded when construction was ROUTE FROM TO DATE BID AWARDED nearly completed on the IRT Contract 3 and the BMT Contract 4 lines. It was obvious that New York needed St. Nicholas W. 122nd W. 132nd March 5, $5.2 million more subway lines. Avenue Street Street 1925 In 1924, the State Legislature passed a home rule bill Eighth W. 28th W. 38th January 19, $5.8 million giving the city control over new routes. On July 1, 1924, Avenue Street Street 1926 the Board of Transportation started preparing plans for Church Park Place W. 3rd January 15, $14 million the network of subway lines that eventually became the Street-Sixth Street 1927 present-day IND. Avenue Construction started on August 18, 1924 under Public Union Nassau Middleton December $8.8 million School 173 at W. 174th Street and Fort Washington Ave- Avenue Avenue Street 26, 1929 nue. Work was completed on December 15, 1925. Sixth Avenue W. 40th W. 47th February 7, $6 million* Mayor Hylan was present at the groundbreaking cere- Street Street 1936 mony, which was held March 14, 1925 at Hancock Square. W. 123rd Street and St. Nicholas Avenue. Con- *Built by Rosoff-Bader Construction Corporation tracts were awarded immediately for work on the first Sam Rosoff’s biography was published in the Septem- two sections, W. 111th to W. 122nd Streets and W. 122nd ber, 1982 Bulletin. to W. 133rd Streets. These contracts stipulated that ex- Contracts for equipment were awarded before con- cavated material not required for backfilling be depos- struction was completed. ited along the banks of the Hudson River for the exten- EQUIPMENT CONTRACT WORK COMPLETED sion of Riverside Drive Park, where lawns, playgrounds, AWARDED and walks were to be constructed. Station Finish June, 1928 August, 1931 Contracts were awarded rapidly. In August, 1925, con- struction was progressing from W. 68th to W. 141st Tracks and Third Rail June, 1928 February, 1931 Streets and from W. 151st to W. 174th Streets. In 1926, the Board was able to award contracts for construction 207th Street Yard January, March, 1931 in midtown and upper Manhattan, but encountered diffi- Buildings 1927* culties in the area south of W. 14th Street. Station Lighting August, 1930 August, 1931 Sixth Avenue originally extended only as for south as Substations June, 1929 August, 1931 Minetta Lane (one block south of W. 3rd Street). It was extended to Canal Street in the 1920s. The contracts for *City took title to property By August, 1931, construction was nearly complete building the subway were delayed due to litigation over and all 300 R-1 cars had been delivered. The Board of the property to be condemned for this extension. Con- Transportation was looking for a private company that tracts for the portion on Sixth Avenue and Greenwich rd would operate the new subway. Neither the IRT nor the Avenue and from W. 3 Street to Park Place were BMT wanted this unprofitable Eighth Avenue Subway, awarded in January and February, 1927 and property whose fare was set at five cents, the same as all the owners were ordered to vacate by March, 1927. The other transit lines. buildings were razed after the city took title to the prop- Meanwhile, the city was conducting negotiations with erty. the IRT and BMT, which were solvent. If the city was Contracts for the Brooklyn extension—Park Place and able to buy these companies, the combined system Church Street to Jay Street and Jay Street from Nassau could be operated at a profit. But the negotiators could Street to Willoughby Street—were awarded in June and not agree on a price. October, 1927, respectively. The Board of Transportation was reluctant to open an When we checked the list of contractors who built the unprofitable subway and it kept postponing the opening new subway, we found that five half-mile sections of the date, which was finally set for September 10, 1932 for IND were built by Sam Rosoff, a famous New Yorker, the portion between Chambers Street and 207th Street who probably built more miles of subway than any man after the West Side Association of Commerce put pres- in the world. He was a practical engineer, who had no sure on the city to take action. formal education or technological training, and was hon- ored by many college graduates. (Continued on page 3) 2 NEW YORK DIVISION BULLETIN - DECEMBER, 2005 Eighth Avenue Subway R-4 CARS 400-899 R-6 CARS 900-1399 R-7 CARS 1400- 1649 (Continued from page 2) Date Number Date Number Date Num- of Cars of Cars ber of CARS Cars In September, 1929, the American Car & Foundry Company was awarded a contract for 300 R-1 cars. Bid February, 76 December, 30 Septem- 8 1933 1935 ber, 1937 price was $8,708,927. Westinghouse Electric & Manu- facturing Company received the contract for 610 motors March, 158 January, 40 October, 32 and controls. Bid price was $2,659,100. Cars were de- 1933 1936 1937 livered from August 8, 1930 to April 28, 1931. Delivery April, 132 February, 84 Novem- 39 dates were as follows: 1933 1936 ber, 1937 DATE NUMBER OF CARS May, 93 March, 99 Decem- 47 DELIVERED TO 207TH STREET YARD 1933 1936 ber, 1937 August, 1930 30 June, 41 April, 1936 78 January, 22 1933 1938 September, 1930 20 May, 1936 90 February, 2 October, 1930 30 1938 November, 1930 40 June, 1936 45 March, 35 1938 December, 1930 40 July, 1936 28 April, 1938 47 January, 1931 40 February, 1931 40 September, 6 May, 1938 18 1936 March, 1931 51 TOTAL 500 500 250 April, 1931 9 TOTAL 300 R-9 CARS 1650-1802 R-10 CARS 1803-1852, 3000- 3349 The R-1s were delivered more than a year before the Date Number of Date Number of IND was opened on September 10, 1932.