IRT Third Avenue Line

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Map Of The Third And Second Avenue El The Red Line Is Second Avenue And The Green Line Is Third Avenue. "© 2007 Metropolitan Transportation Authority".

The Third Avenue Line, or Third Avenue El, was an elevated railway in Manhattan and the Bronx, New York City. It passed into the ownership of the Interborough Rapid Transit Company (IRT) and eventually the New York City Subway.

In the 1930s and '40s, as part of the integration of the different subway companies in New York City—the IRT along with Brooklyn–Manhattan Transit (BMT) and Independent Subway System (IND)—the Third Avenue El and its counterparts on Second, Sixth, and Ninth Avenues came under criticism from New York mayor Fiorello La Guardia and his successors. The Els were regarded as blights to their communities and obsolete, given that subways were being built, or were on the drawing board, to replace them.

The IND Sixth Avenue Line and the IND Eighth Avenue Line did indeed render the Sixth and Ninth Avenue Els obsolete. Save for a small shuttle service for the Polo Grounds on the Ninth Avenue Line, they were closed by 1940 and demolished by 1941. The Second Avenue El was also gradually demolished from 1940 to 1942, leaving only the Third Avenue El, which was intended to stay in use until the Second Avenue Subway was built to replace it. However, government bureaucracy and pressure from private developers, eager to redevelop Third Avenue, forced the closure of the El prematurely with no adequate subway replacement, leaving residents on the East Side of Manhattan with the overcrowded IRT Lexington Avenue Line as the only subway east of Fifth Avenue.

The system was closed in sections from 1950 to 1973. First, the South Ferry spur was closed in 1950, which connected South Ferry to Chatham Square in Manhattan. This forever closed the South Ferry elevated station, which had serviced all four IRT El lines that originally ran in Manhattan. Next to close was the City Hall spur in 1953, which started at Park Row in Manhattan and then connected with the South Ferry spur at Chatham Square. On May 12, 1955 the main portion of the line from Chatham Square to East 149th Street in the Bronx closed, ending the operation of elevated service in Manhattan. The removal aided property values along the East Side, and the head of the Real Estate Board of New York suggested that Third Avenue be renamed "The Bouwerie" to symbolize the transformation.^[1]

In the 1960s, the remaining service was named the 8. Finally, the remaining portion of the line in the Bronx from East 149th Street to Gun Hill Road closed in April 1973.

In the Bronx, the line was replaced by the Bx55 Limited bus route making only the stops the former line made. This bus route was one of the first to have free transfers with the subway with the transfer points at the 3rd Avenue-149th Street and Gun Hill Road White Plains Road IRT stations. With the introduction of free bus to subway transfers systemwide, the Bx55 lost its special status.

[edit] In popular culture

The El was most prominently featured in:

• The movie King Kong (1933)
• The Ray Milland drama The Lost Weekend (1945)
• The film noir drama The Naked City (1948)
• The Frank Sinatra/Gene Kelly musical On the Town (1949)

In the alternate history book Sideslip by Ted White and Dave van Arnam, depicting an alternate reality where Earth is ruled by aliens from space, the Third Avenue El survives into 1968.

[edit] Station listing

[edit] Notes

[edit] References

• Rapid Transit on the Bowery, New York Times August 26, 1878 page 8
• Crossings on Elevated Roads, New York Times March 14, 1879 page 8
• 42d St. Elevated Stops, New York Times December 7, 1923 page 19
• City Brevities, New York Times April 15, 1924 page 10
• 34th St. Elevated Ends Long Service, New York Times July 15, 1930 page 15
• Westchester Line Passes with 1937, New York Times January 1, 1938 page 36
• Old 'El' Link Ends Its 72-Year Uproar, New York Times December 23, 1950 page 23
• City Hall 'El' Spur at End of the Line, New York Times January 1, 1954 page 25
• Last Train Rumbles on Third Ave. 'El', New York Times May 13, 1955 page 1
• Cars are Packed for Last 'El' Trip, New York Times May 13, 1955 page 16
• Third Ave. El Reaches the End of Its Long, Noisy, Blighted, Nostalgic Life, New York Times April 29, 1973 page 24

[edit] Further reading

• Stelter, Lawrence, and Lother Stelter. (1995). By the El: Third Avenue and Its El at Mid-Century. Flushing, NY: H&M Productions. ISBN 1882608127.

[edit] External links

• nycsubway.org — The Third Avenue El
• archive.org - The Third Avenue El (ca.1950s)

[edit] See also