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| Re: Old LIRR Rockaway Beach Branch (1252656) | |||
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Re: Old LIRR Rockaway Beach Branch |
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Posted by Mitch45 on Wed Oct 9 18:42:36 2013, in response to Re: Old LIRR Rockaway Beach Branch, posted by randyo on Wed Oct 9 17:36:38 2013. A few thoughts."Actually, the IRT and BMT were NOT making money but were hamstrung by the city's refusal to allow the privates to raise the fare above a nickel." That didn't occur until after World War I, when inflation and higher labor and parts costs set in. In fact, the nickel fare was put into the contracts at the insistence of the traction companies, who were afraid that the city would demand that the fare be lowered once the public started to use the system in earnest. Before World War I, the IRT was very profitable. One other thing: the IRT was also hamstrung by the terms of its 1902 purchase of the elevated lines. The IRT owed the elevateds' stockholders a lot of money. "This gave rise to the construction of a lower portion of the Lex Av Subway below 42 St to connect the upper Lex to the BRT's Bway Subway." I don't think anything was actually built by the BRT on the Lexington line. I think the BRT's willingness to build the upper Lexington line was enough to get August Belmont back to the table. "Many of the lines that are now part of the iND were originally intended to be built as extensions of the BRT/BMT..." Are you referring to the Triborough subway expansion plan, which came before the Dual Contracts but was ultimately rejected by the PSC and the Courts? "Actually, after Hylan left office, the city decided it really didn't want to operate the new lines and since its dimensions were almost identical to the BMT's, offered them to the BMT. The BMT declined to operate the new lines unless it was allowed to raise the fare above 5 cents which the city would not allow it to do and since the new lines were substantially completed, the city found itself obligated to operate the new subway under the newly established Board of Transportation." I read somewhere that the City took bids from private companies to operate the IND and got just one offer, from the Oakdale Contracting Company, which didn't really want to pay the City anything. |
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