I Found a Gem

Hi Folks:

  I came across this video by accident.  It is titled " Trolley Lines of Brooklyn PCC Cars Home Movie 52964MB" .  This movie was shot by Ben Young during the period of 1951 to 1956 and concentrates on the last three PCC operated lines in Brooklyn, Namely the Church Avenue, McDonald Avenue and Coney Island Avenue lines.    I never saw such a long trolley video and it lasts 29 minutes.  This movie covers many of the topics that is discussed in this blog.  A heavy concentration is on the portion of the Church Avenue line at the waterfront, just four blocks from the future Luchenbach ship disaster in December, 1956.  You see in detail the private right of way between First and Second Avenues to the loop.  You see hilly 39th Street as well with a shot a 39th Street 13th Avenue at the fruit store, which may have been called "Burdo Brothers - Poor People Friends".  You look up 13th Avenue and you see the Culver Line.  You will see the garages that I spoke about at 37th Street and the Lumber yard, the former Nassau Electric depot.  You see the Ocean Parkway underpass and you can catch a view of the Kings County Hospital main tower in the distance.  Some Culver Line shots are also shown with B type and AB type BMT standard cars.  You will also see the Ninth Avenue Depot and McDonald Avenue with a sharp decline to Coney Island in the distance.  Other shots include the Coney Island Avenue line at Church Avenue and the private right of way near the ocean with BMT trains overhead at the Ocean Parkway station.  The Coney Island Avenue viaduct over the Belt Highway is shown with PCC cars running gracefully in the middle.

Much more.  Copy and paste the code below in your browser.  You will really enjoy this.

It was nice to see all the old stores again.  The PCC Cars really ran fast and kept up  in traffic.

Tramway Null (0)

https://youtu.be/ZcL9nVShr48?t=33

Somewhere Along McDonald Avenue

The photo below, also comes from the New York Transit Museum Archives and it is from the Lonto-Watson collection.  It was taken on April 9, 1955 somewhere along McDonald Avenue.  This is the period after the Culver Line was "captured" by the IND Subway in October 1954 and PCC streetcars were found on the last three streetcar lines in Brooklyn (Church Avenue, Church-McDonald and Coney Island Avenue)  Streetcar service ended under the Culver Line on October 31, 1956.  This great shot shows a train of R1-9 cars on the Independent "D" Line (Sixth Avenue Line) between 205th Street in the Bronx and Coney Island.  Great side view shot of the PCC car and the"D" train. The PCC car shares its' tracks with the South Brooklyn Railroad.

Looking North from Ditmas Avenue Brooklyn 2009

This shot was taken by Leonard Wilson on 4/15/2009 and it shows a R-160B F Train emerging from the tunnel south of the Church Avenue Station.  I took this photo off the http://www.nycsubway.org website because in this one picture, many of the topics that this blog discusses is shown.  You can see the tunnel into which the F train goes into south of Church Avenue.  This tunnel was built for the Independent Subway.  This portals' construction date is not clear. It may have been built after the Church Avenue station opened in 1933 or later, perhaps before World War II.  The actual incline did not have service until October, 1954 when the IND subway "captured" the BMT Culver Line.  For many years, the incline, which has space for four tracks had only one track, the northbound local track, was actually connected to the BMT Culver Elevated.  I read someplace that in the middle of the incline, there was a large tree growing probably through the war years.   In the picture, you will also see the large radio tower at Bishop Ford High School which was the location of the 9th Avenue trolley depot that was in service until 1956.  This trolley barn had two levels.  Also, if you look at the right side of the incline, you can see serveral vertical iron beams that were used to support the McDonald Avenue trolley wires.  Believe it or not, some of the insulators and a few inches of trolley support span wire are still in the horizontal position!  These are probably the very last of the few artifacts of the great trolley operation in Brooklyn.  The only other artifacts are several trolley line support poles scattered throughtout Brooklyn and an occasional peak of trolley track through asphalt for the few tracks that have not been pulled yet.

McDonald Avenue PCC and South Bklyn RR Diesel # 8 at Avenue "I'

Picture Source:  Undated.  Frank Pfuhler Collection from Dave's Rail Pix: http://www.davesrailpix.com/nyc/htm/bqt806.htm

In this undated photo, a McDonald Avenue PCC car is headed north while South Brooklyn RR Locomotive # 8 switches tracks.  An observation of the area makes me believe that this is under the Avenue "I" station of the IND Culver Line prior to abandonment around 1956.  Presently, "Shop Rite" is on the left.  From my previous track diagram, there is no other crossover between tracks on McDonald Avenue except at Avenue "I".  Though not shown in the picture, a couple hundred feet north in the picture is a overpass over the LIRR Bay Ridge Division which at that time had two tracks and had high voltage type of overhead.  Surprisingly, tracks remained intact on McDonald Avenue many decades after 1956.  In the early 1980's, the overpass over the LIRR tracks was reconstructed but without trolley tracks.  Around the 1990's,  the trolley tracks were covered with asphalt and within the last 10 years, the trolley tracks were completely pulled out of the pavement from Cortelyou Road to around the Avenue X shops by the New York City's Department of Transportation probably because of complaints from motorist that the tracks were slippery in wet weather.  In my humble opinion, McDonald Avenue would have been good candidate for a historic streetcar line because the tracks were there, the electric power source was a few feet above on the el, and the trolley wires did not need poles for support.  Could you have imagined the action movie shots of chases on McDonald Avenue dodging trolley cars under the el?  The fees that New York City could have received  from these movie shotscould have paid many of the expenses connected with this hypothetical trolley line.  Today, there are no tracks on McDonald Avenue, the LIRR Bay Ridge Division at this point has one track that is diesel operated, and the interchange track between SBRR and the LIRR at Avenue I (south of this shot) in back of  "Shop Rite" is gone.

Gravesend(McDonald) Avenue Line Bklyn 1926-1940

Source:  B. Linder & Edward B. Watson, New York Division Bulletin, Vol. 20, Number 5, October 1977, Pages 2-9.

The above map covers the period between 1926 and 1940 when the steel elevated structure above Gravesend Avenue (McDonald Avenue) was already in operation.  Notice the red circled sidings at Kings Highway which was at a coal silo and the sidings north of Avenue U.  This later siding may be connected with the Gravesend Race Track.  However, from an earlier drawing, the Brooklyn Jockey Club siding was at Avenue T.  There is much to discuss here including the fact that this trackage was also served by the South Brooklyn Railway, which used electric trolley steeple locomotive to haul box cars for freight delivery to commercial customers along 37 Street and McDonald Avenue such as the coal company south of Kings Highway.  See earlier posting regarding Kensington Junction which is at Ditmas Avenue and McDonald Avenue.

Location of Streetcar and Trolleybus Routes prior to bustitution: 1955-60 (Approx. Layout)

Church Avenue Line 1923-56

The Church Avenue Line with its' sister, the McDonald Avenue Line died on October 31, 1956. On that same day, the Cortelyou Road trolleybus also died. The Church Avenue line was unique in that it had its own separate two track tunnel crossing Ocean Parkway. If we follow the model of last out first in, the Church Avenue Line would be a good candidate for revival. The question is, should the entire line be equipped with streetcars? Looking at the track diagrams, we see that the line ran over some private right of way trackage in the Sunset Park area between first and second avenues off 39 th Street. At the other end, a trolley loop at Bristol Street was also in a private right of way. The Church Avenue line today is a busy one, and I do not have the statistics at hand, but in 1989 there were plans that called for the conversion of this line to trolleybus (trackless trolley) along with the Bx-12 route in the Bronx. Of course, nothing ever came of these plans. In its' last days, the Church Avenue Trolley started at a loop at First Avenue and runs along a private right of way until Second Avenue, It curved slightly on Second Avenue and turned east on 39 th Street, going up a hill. Along 39 Street, there was in the past turnouts for the 3 rd Avenue Line, the Fifth Avenue Line, the 8th Avenue Line and yes, the West End Trolley at 39 th Street and New Utrecht Avenue. The West End Trolley was never replaced with a bus after the line died around 1948. At 39 th Street and 13 th Avenue, the line makes a sharp curve and runs east on 13 th Avenue to 37 Street. At this point, the lines crosses the South Brooklyn Railway trolley-freight tracks and makes a sharp curve east. At this point, I remember near the beginning of Church Avenue there was a stub track leading to the former Nassau Electric yards. More about this later. the line now enters Church Avenue and joins and crosses the McDonald Avenue Line. This was a complicated junction with many curves. The line goes underground for a short distance crossing Ocean Parkway. The line surfaces and crosses the Coney Island Avenue Line that died in 1955. The line continues and crosses Flatbush Avenue and crosses Rogers Avenue. At Rogers Avenue, there was what is called a "Wye" that allows for a single ended car, such as a PCC car to reverse directions without a loop. Nostrand Avenue and Utica Avenues Lines are crossed as well, There was a branch at East 98 th Street but I do not know what line this connected to. At Hegeman Avenue, there was a small PRW at the loop and there was a turnout to the Carnarsie Depot. In a future blog, I will show the approximate location of a much bigger PRW that ran from East 98 th Street to Rockaway Avenue. This private right of way was in operation until 1928 and it could be seen by aerial photographs of the area in 1924 and 1951. According to Edward B. Watson, a trolley historian, the Church Avenue Line used 11, 8, and presently 35 as its' route numbers. Over the years, many other trolley routes used the Church Avenue trackage to reach Coney Island or Sheepshead Bay.

In this map, I used ARCGIS and New York Subway and Bus Line shape files to produce a map what streetcar lines and trolleybus lines existed and their routes (as close as I can) during the period of 1955 to 1960 when all electric surface transportation was abandoned.  Since I did not have shape files of the old trolley and trolley bus lines, I had to use modern bus routes (from three years ago) to produce a map that approaches the electric transportation coverage at time of abandonment.