Plans to extend the R through the Narrows into Staten Island changed.
by Rich Watson
The Bay Ridge-95 Street subway station is a terminal point on the long route of the R train through three boroughs. It exits onto the BR neighborhood in the southern part of Brooklyn.
It shouldn’t have been an end point, however. When it was created, the line was meant to go through the river and continue into Staten Island.
The R line and Bay Ridge
The R line, part of the BMT Broadway Line with the N, Q, and W, goes from
- Forest Hills, through western Queens,
- into midtown Manhattan, through Times Square,
- down Broadway to South Ferry,
- into Brooklyn, past Borough Hall, and
- down Fourth Avenue to Bay Ridge.
The 95 Street station opened in 1925. It was originally called Fort Hamilton, the name of a nearby army installation from 1831 that provides support for the Army National Guard and the Army Reserve. ADA upgrades to the station are in the works.
BR is mostly made of Italians, Irish, Greeks and Arabs. It received its moment in the sun during the opening credits of the movie Saturday Night Fever.
Jimmy Fallon is from the neighborhood. Brooklyn Dodgers Pee Wee Reese and Duke Snider lived there.
Unfinished subway stations and routes
For all of New York’s notoriety as the city with the world’s biggest subway system, some stations and routes, to this day, are either abandoned or incomplete.
The Q train on Second Avenue, for instance, has struggled to extend north through the Upper East Side—and that is only one part of a plan to create a route going the length of Second Avenue, one over a century old.
Among the abandoned stations include ones
- below City Hall,
- in the lower level of Port Authority,
- at Chambers Street in the World Trade Center area,
- at the Bowery, and
- at Myrtle Avenue in Brooklyn, near the Manhattan Bridge.
Additional unfinished lines include ones at Utica Avenue and South Fourth Street, both in Brooklyn.
Alternative uses have sprung for some of these places, such as the art installation that creates an animation when you go past it on the subway.
I’ve always wished the subway extended further into Queens than it does. If money and labor weren’t an issue, some possibilities I’d like to see include:
- the C past Euclid Avenue to Rosedale via North Conduit Avenue,
- the R past 71 Ave to Queens Village via Union Turnpike
- the 7 past Flushing to Bayside via Northern Boulevard
Plus, I’d reroute the 3 from 110 Street and send it to LaGuardia Airport via Astoria Boulevard. Yes, I have given this a lot of thought.
But what about the line from Bay Ridge to Staten Island?
The Staten Island tunnel
In 1923, work began on a tunnel connecting Brooklyn to its neighbor across the Narrows, Staten Island. John Hylan was mayor at the time.
A proposed Brooklyn-SI rail tunnel popped up as early as 1888, before the unification of the five boroughs in 1898, and the opening of the subway in 1904. It didn’t happen due to limited technology and financing.
Hylan, a former railroad laborer, wanted two tracks for both passenger and freight usage. The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad (B&O) had freight sidings—tracks for unused cars—in SI at the time. Hylan thought passenger usage alone wouldn’t justify the expense.
He personally hosted the groundbreaking ceremony in BR to open the Brooklyn end of the tunnel.
Freight, in the form of the Pennsylvania Railroad, opposed the plan. At the time, they owned the B&O (and the B&O ran the Staten Island Railway). They wanted a tunnel from Brooklyn to New Jersey, with a spur in SI. They saw Hylan’s plan as intruding on their turf. The governor, who had a financial investment in the Pennsylvania RR, was on their side. Both sides fought.
By 1925, Hylan was out as mayor. The Brooklyn-SI tunnel was put on permanent hold. The Pennsylvania RR’s Brooklyn-NJ tunnel never happened. The B&O ended all passenger service north of Baltimore by 1958.
Transportation in Staten Island
So how do SI residents connect with the rest of the city?
You probably know about the Staten Island Ferry, the ship which goes to lower Manhattan. Within SI, the Railway connects the ferry terminus at St. George with Tottenville, going down the eastern end of the island.
Connecting SI to Brooklyn is the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge, completed in 1964. BR is at the foot of the Brooklyn end, minutes from the R train. In SI, it exits onto the boulevard named for Hylan. The Verrazzano is one of seven toll bridges in New York.
And the MTA operates buses in SI, as they do throughout the rest of the city.
Other alternatives?
Over the years, plans designed to connect lower Brooklyn with SI and/or New Jersey, in some fashion, have come and gone. The Verrazzano remains the best choice.
Earlier this year, current Mayor Eric Adams entertained the possibility of ferry service between Brooklyn and SI.
As is often the case in New York, money and politics will factor into the decision to complete the tunnel, if it’s ever made.
@byrichwatson
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Have you ever taken the R train to Bay Ridge?
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