The evening world. Newspaper, March 24, 1900, Page 6

THE WORLD: SATURDAY | IFT] STORY OF RAPID TRANSIT’S 1} Told by Men Who Have Been Id Which at Last Has Bee THE FIR’ HAMPIONS. So EnY mooDBenY raobom MPIO! THE MAN WHO WILL B ’ ‘Commissioner 1890-91; 1894-1900. ne RAPID TRANSIT’S BEGINNING. AYOR HUGH J, GRANT appointed s Rapid Trans! Conmiion wedes t HOw Biggest Contract Ever Giv: MZ Potter, William Stein John H. Starin and Woodbury Langdon. WOODBUL.. ..sGDON, Commisatoner, BY EX-MAYOR HUGH J. GRANT. commission held many meetings. We had no regular meeting pice, and HB needs of the city in the matter of better transit facilities were ee met most frequently at the house of Mr. peck tay gat Lstprondbed poy ~, M BY JOHN B ‘ preseing at che time that I become Mayor that the attention of those eon- of TA? ome. fo) Kaiten essed the, duties of m aecrelary. HE firs: spadetul of earth taken nected with the administration of muntcipal affair was directed to some It didn't take the commission long to @lscover that It wus practically power- by the Mayor from City Hall Park solution of tht rapid-transit problem carly in 19. There were no Greater New less, The law of 1875, under which the elevated railroad system had been estab- to-day, between the two white posts York then, The city was all longitudinal, Efforts were mate to secure i eget Yatge be eee of be busry basrtul peed oe eae ae. in front of the City Hall, wii aark the crea atving rapté-trensi and Naseau street; forbade us to go on, sai * # beginning of the subway, pasenge ot Serw etpnting aed Senne ennne Se | Peete: tsi ninth street of Madison avenue above Forty-second street. Kika cacy @nayi aa Gaeta tis ‘Tiase efforts falling, 1 resetved to appoint commission, under the same law siecle Rien os sserats wmsean to thins eet work on the rapid transit tunnel has which Mayor Wickham followed in appointing the commission of 167. transft scheme could be devised. Hours were spent listening to all sorte of now reached » point where it will have ‘The commiasion appointed by me comprised the tate August Belmont, Oomme- 2 | nemes and examining every conceivable plan or project looking to the solution Tf Smooth sailing. Gore John H. Starin, the late William Steinway, Woodbury Langdon and the late of the problem of rapid transit. Among the schemes examined were these: at first progress will be slow. Orlando B. Potter. " Extension of the Manhattan “L; Boynton bicycle rallway; Thorpe's six-track Until we get into the ewing of the See Ee ET YOR, ENS ‘They found the conditions ee changed that the old law operated to prohibit“ aiway on an embankment built on land reclaimed from North and East Rivers; ‘f thing a small gang of men will be em- Unéer bie admintatration and by hie taitiative the Sret move rather than to further such rapid transit as was needed in 16, They were for- Wegman & Bates's six-track. three-deck road; Speer's endless train; Collett's sus- ployed. This gang will operate along the bidden to go over, under of across certain avenues Indispensable to any scheme of 7 ronded rallway; Wenigman’s archway tunnel; Austin Corbin's deep tunnel plan; 4 lower end of the tunnel and will be in- rapid tranait up and down Manhattan Island, and they indited @ memorial te that the Greathead system of metallic tunnels; Jesse W. Reed's four-track tunnel, sup- T creased as the work is extended north. effect and resigned. ported by columns; Dr. ShefMield's tunnel bullt through the blocks; Major Hen- There will be all classes of labor rep- ‘The next year, thanks te the careful work of John M. Bowers, whe them, end 7 ning’s gravity system; J. Coleman Drayton's city railway through the blocks, Just + resented in building the subway, The AMterward, as counsel to the Rapid-Transit Commission, through laws and emend- J bejow the surtace, and roofed over and covered with fine fireproof buildings; Frank T needs of the work are so varied that ments érawn by him, cleared the way for the work now about to be consummated, Oprague's tubular four-track system, and a combination subway and surface rail- nearly every kind of labor will be neces. ‘a law was paseed creating a Rapid-Transit Commission for the city. The mem- way. sary to fill them. was made toward rea! rapid transit, E bers were Gamuel Spencer, one of the ablest raliroad engineers in the world; the The pi.n of buying a right of way <hrough the blocks was given serfous con- There is no way ef telling the exact ‘The tunnel will late John H. Inman, William Steinway, Eugene L. Bushe and John H. Starin, sideration, until data as to cost put it out of the reckoning. number of men who will be engaged at @Oet 266s + 088,000,600 My idea and that of those with whom I had advised was that the only real This commission reached two definite conclusions: First, that real rapid 7 frat, but when the tunnel gets under ‘There will be os- sslution of the problem of how to render the upper sections easily and quickly ec- 4 transit could be had only by « four-track road, and second, that the only feasible 1 way at least 6,000 to 18000 laborers wi!l Sed for labor ceasibie to the business city, and thus make that upper section desirable for resi- route for such a road wan to be found under ground. be scattered over tts different sections. ‘dence, was by an underground road. ‘The death of President Belmomt aint Commissioner Potter practically ended It fs a dificult thing just now to say Wee te he come Many obstaces presented themssives to the commission im their efforts to 1 that commission. The amendments in 189 to the Rapld-Tranwit law cleared the & whether street surfaces will be open to carry out this project, and they turned to the study of plans for extending and way for a new commission, in which the late John H. Inman, 8a %uel Spencer and any great extent at Qrat. The require- widening the scope and services of the existing elevated and surface railway sys- Kugene L. Bushe were associated with Commissioners Steinway and Starin, and 7 ments of the work will regulate the ! it ae ment will cost.. tome. But nothing came of it, and this commission resigned. they went on with the work. speed of proceedings, se that It i im- Motimated cost of Unéer further amendment of the laws a new commission was formed in 18— possible to calculate how long the street the present commission, with such changes as have resulted from death or other Mr. Langdon was not tn the commission again until the present board was surfaces will remain open after they Geet ccction of natural causes. created under the act of 186. have been disturbed. vead from Otty I Delieve that through all the successive anges and yh seats coumiasestion <t (PRR RRR Pisses ieee On the same principle, I cannot estate Mati to itty- the problem, the Commissioners have had only the city's Interests In , an how many streets will be torn up at one Binth street ... 15,000,000 ‘shall watch with great interest the development in fact of the theortes advanced by HIS FIRST TUNNEL SEVEN MILES LONG. time. These things are matters for af- the commission and its engineer. 4 ter consideration, but the specifications city. But I have been too busy with other affairs to keep myself abreast with ‘as rand CHMiale by meanee ot the | Saved men, and over three years ‘As I have said, I have favored an underground road from fimit to limit of the OHN 1, MDONALD, who te to give) McDonald and his partner, Ryan, ome PohbbbbrbHEbebihhhheh 9 development in rapid transit, and I am not in a position to predict or prophesy | twenty-one mile subway, firet | were consumed in finishing the work, LABOR. what the future may bring forth. ave Sewnge, rain and cracking street suf- MeDonald will canploy 0,000 to 10,000 Tt should not be forgotten that when that first commission was appointed oy f Proved his ability yp ball aged suite cxtacd nuns and "S08, men night and day. me in 1890 the idea of niunichal ownership had not been thought of, nor had anyone Rafiroad s seven-mile belt tunnel under | When the tunnel was wt last finished Suggested that the city’s credit might or could be drawn upon for such the Patapsco River at Baltimore. it was the largest of its kind, varying Indeed, special lerisiative enactment was necessary efter the iden itself ‘This tunnel snoftened by fifteen min- |from 49 to 65 feet In width. Three elec- assimilated by the popular mind, to extend the debt limit so as to comprehend this utes the train time between New York’| tric motors, each weighing 9 tons, run materials used and competent as en- vast undertaking. When we began ten years ago we could only hope to tnterest and Washington. | through it, operated on a trolley system. gineers to pee that everything ts done private or corporate capital to build the tunnel, The completo failure of that plan It was begun ten years ago and cost | One of the three motors can pull 3,000 right and with the right materials. In 1896 resulted in the birth and growth of the idea of munietpal construction. $7,000,000, or about $1,000,000 a mile, tons dead weight eee lca A COMPLETE MAP OF THE BIG TWENTY-ONE-MILE TUNNEL. Ps hy ‘The black dote are loca! stations; the dote with a ring around, express etations. The black line marke the underground work; the dotted lines show where the cars will run either on the surface | CENTRAL PARK WEST GHARLis .. sMITH. Commissioner, or on elevated tracke, c &§ N TFT R A DL st lefebieleiinini-i THE PERSONALITY OF JOHN B. M’DONALD) He is fifty-six years of age, 5 feet 7 inches tn height and weighs 16 THE TUNNEL. 21 Miles Long 4 He paseee recor ot fle time th the ofan alr und ts tn, partect phy , . MADISON AVE. His habits and tastes are domesic. ‘ile eats and drinks in, mocoratioa and Fall of Grades. LLU Sia He lv'marriea ‘und lives a: the Dakors. TVW IHN] | ORAno CENTRAL CePor iteteletet ‘The popular supposition that fe wéerground = rapid-transit wailway will run on a perfectiy WHAT “THE WORLD” H By COM The Only Member of the i This should be a day of special |ure inimical to the scheme satisfaction to The World, for that about to pass in the L newspaper began an agitation for! Albany, ft chartered a special rapid transit—and underground rapid | drawing-room cars and transit—fully fifteen years ago. It/ representative delegation, ic has never flagged in its zeal for the|severu! first-cltss speakers @>ithe project. Early and late, in season | Capitol to protest against its . and out of season, it has kept up the cry for a rapid-transit tunnel, It ee-| cured and published a vast amount of | information concerning underground | railways in other lands and cities, and| made the idea familiar to its readers. | The World has also consistently advocated every necessary legislative enactment for carrying out the proj- ect. On one occasion, when a meas- | a { to One Hun- eenth street under wa maim | | MATERIALS. will be ex- ain ht the Millions of Tons Will Be Used. In the list of materials for the tun- nel are (6,000 tons of stee! beams and 2,000 square yards of enamelled facing for the walls of the stations. The road will have $00,000 feet of un- derground track and @,00 feet of elevated track. The delvers must remove 79,900,453 cuble fem of rock aad earth from under New York. The contractor must find a place to put 2,000,000 cartioads of materials that will be taken out to make this hole the length of Manhattan Island, Over half a million wagonloads of brick, mortar and other materials will take the place of the stuff ex- gosvated, THE CITY WILL OWN IT IN 1954. THE DIFFERENT COMMISSIONS. BY BIRD 8. COLEK, COMP. ROLLER. er eee 1a T the expiratio: ra the | ® . eee reece 1675. ° city ple 1" ran of nis MAYOR WILLIAM I. WICK. APPOINTED BY THE RAPID Rapid Transit Tunnel Railway COMMISSION, WHICH | TRANSIT ACT: The cost of constr will be met by THe 8 8ELEVATED ader FE. Orr, as Preai- a sinking fund es shed umier the Gent of the Chamber of Com- contract, This fund is created by an merece. annual contribution made by the con- Seth Lew, tractor of only 1 per cent. on the cost, which will be ample for that purpose The improvement there becomes the property of the city, ‘The contractor has an option to } the road for twenty- five years thereafter at a price to be agreed upon at that time, The sum pald under such a lease will be a net profit a ey i ‘ SPTROLLER 000006-00000000-006-000000000000000000004 During the fifty years which Contrac- ~e tor McDonald operates the road the in AN ABLE ADVOCATE. terest of the construction bonds ts pald ‘i one * by him, #0 that without cost the pd Tas By Bird S. Coler. nécipal ownership is secured of the road and {ts equipment at that time tary Brooklyn railroad tunnel under way, and it will not be Jong before an- macdear aun Cee ae eeteme | other municipal gala day will herald the tial agreement of opinion, though nec- cietion. Tos wiamatey pas ordeal essarily conjectural and approximate | vers ana soundings are already pro- The people, now that this great Work | vided for and sterdy progress is belug has taken definite shape, naturally are] made towart a practical initiation of getting Impatient to see the the work of construction, | (Editorial tm TO HARLEM IN To Harlem in fiftess mpoites transit. That is what ¢l railroad can never is patience surrenders the ‘to: To F rin i a TTT as TOU rncritat | Hi | it | \\ | Keane Mi = if POLL im wl UHHH mM mn il