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W.B. Fishbowl
Age: 57
Joined: 02 Oct 2014
Posts: 2506
Location: New York, New York, USA
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 Posted: Fri May 03, 2024 12:59 pm Post subject: |
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And the funny (peculiar) thing about this "Borgaschmord"? The R-40 wasn't even an A/C! |
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
BusTalk's Offical Welcoming Committee
Joined: 18 Dec 2007
Posts: 23060
Location: NEW JOISEY
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| Posted: Fri May 03, 2024 1:04 pm Post subject: |
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| W.B. Fishbowl wrote: |
And the funny (peculiar) thing about this "Borgaschmord"? The R-40 wasn't even an A/C! |
W.B.:
Dang, we DO think alike.....I was thinking the SAME thing! 
"NYO" |
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
BusTalk's Offical Welcoming Committee
Joined: 18 Dec 2007
Posts: 23060
Location: NEW JOISEY
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
BusTalk's Offical Welcoming Committee
Joined: 18 Dec 2007
Posts: 23060
Location: NEW JOISEY
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W.B. Fishbowl
Age: 57
Joined: 02 Oct 2014
Posts: 2506
Location: New York, New York, USA
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| Posted: Mon May 06, 2024 8:45 am Post subject: |
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From what I've gathered online from a 1924 book put out by the Transit Commission and on Google Books, that Times Square station (and possibly Main Street too) was designed and built after the specs for platform edges were changed. This applied to both the IRT and the BMT's subway-operating arm, New York Rapid Transit Corporation (NYRT, or "En-Wye-Are-Tee"). Quoting directly from this book:
| Quote: | | Distance from CL of track to permanent edge of platform, I.R.T. = 4'-11 3/4"; N.Y.R.T. Corp. = 5'-5 1/2". Distance from CL of track to temporary edge of platform, I.R.T. = 4'-8 1/4"; N.Y.R.T. Corp. = 5' 2". |
The "rubbing board" which represented the temporary platform edge would now be cut on all "lines" at 3 1/2" x 2". When the replacement 33rd Street terminus of the then-H&M was built in the late 1930's, the permanent edge was set at 4'-11" to go with the temporary edge of 4'-7 1/2" that was the "Aitch-and-Em's," and to this day PATH's, standard.
The "N.Y.R.T. Corp." specs, along with the track clearances et al., would go on to be adopted by what started out life as the Independent Subway System. Only there was a change in another aspect:
| Quote: | | Distance from CL of track to clearance line at base of rail = 5' 2". |
After 1928 or so, this would only be applicable to the "Eye-Are-Tee" (given 1957 contract drawings once on eBay for the platform extension of their 96th Street station on Broadway that I once had image scans of from an eBay auction, but thankfully took notes since, once the Flash drive holding it malfunctioned and the data couldn't be recovered, all was not lost); for the "Bee-Em-Tee" and, thus, also "Eye-En-Dee," that distance would be 5' 4". The earliest contract drawings with that newer spec for the "Bee-Em-Tee" would be for the Eighth Avenue terminus of the 14th Street line, drawn up in 1928.
Prior to this standardization, platform edge specs were much different. In the prior decade, when the main Dual Contracts lines were built, the specs used by the then-"Bee-Are-Tee" were 5' 4" for the permanent platform edge (hence the rubbing board's width was 2" and depth 1 1/2"), and over on the "Eye-Are-Tee" their permanent platform edge had been 4'-9 1/2" and temporary edge 4'-7 3/4" (and the rubbing board width 1 3/4" by 1 1/2"). Thus, for whatever reason, the older subway, on newer builds, lost about 1/2" on their "temporary platform edge" from the track center line - which strangely was 1/4" short of the track gauge of 4'-8 1/2". |
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
BusTalk's Offical Welcoming Committee
Joined: 18 Dec 2007
Posts: 23060
Location: NEW JOISEY
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| Posted: Mon May 06, 2024 9:27 am Post subject: |
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W.B.:
FASCINATING historical information, and something that even many serious enthusiasts are not aware of.
Many of us (Your's Truly included) tend to think of platforms as either simply being wide or narrow; when I was working downtown, I well recall how narrow (and I DO mean NARROW!) the northern end was of the platform at the "Eye-Are-Tee" 7th Avenue (#'s 2 and 3) station was.
One thing that concerns platform edges is the following from "UNDER THE SIDEWALKS OF NEW YORK" (Cudahy).......
".......in 1949, the Dual contacts arrangement of joint IRT-BMT service on the Flushing and Astoria lines was eliminated. The Flushing line with its new cars became an entirely IRT operation, while the Astoria line had its platforms shaved back to take care of operation as an extension of the BMT's regular subway service......"
"NYO"
["TRAINS TO ASTORIA"] |
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
BusTalk's Offical Welcoming Committee
Joined: 18 Dec 2007
Posts: 23060
Location: NEW JOISEY
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| Posted: Mon May 06, 2024 9:34 am Post subject: |
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Also worth noting (from the same book).........
".......the new postwar IRT cars were assigned solely to the Flushing line, and not to the basic Manhattan routes of the old Interborough, because the upper Broadway line and the lower Lexington Avenue line were oriented on the vestibuled body styles of Belmont's basic car......................."
".......new postwar rolling stock with a different door arrangement could not travel these older IRT routes until considerable engineering work was done. The platform gap fillers, for instance, installed at several stations, would not function at all with cars of a different body design........."
"NYO"
["I.R.T. LINES"] |
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W.B. Fishbowl
Age: 57
Joined: 02 Oct 2014
Posts: 2506
Location: New York, New York, USA
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| Posted: Mon May 06, 2024 11:03 am Post subject: |
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| NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629 wrote: | W.B.:
FASCINATING historical information, and something that even many serious enthusiasts are not aware of.
Many of us (Your's Truly included) tend to think of platforms as either simply being wide or narrow; when I was working downtown, I well recall how narrow (and I DO mean NARROW!) the northern end was of the platform at the "Eye-Are-Tee" 7th Avenue (#'s 2 and 3) station was.
One thing that concerns platform edges is the following from "UNDER THE SIDEWALKS OF NEW YORK" (Cudahy).......
".......in 1949, the Dual contacts arrangement of joint IRT-BMT service on the Flushing and Astoria lines was eliminated. The Flushing line with its new cars became an entirely IRT operation, while the Astoria line had its platforms shaved back to take care of operation as an extension of the BMT's regular subway service......"
"NYO"
["TRAINS TO ASTORIA"] |
That was a different type of narrow. I was going by from the track center. Perhaps the narrowest platforms in the "Eye-En-Dee," for example, can be found on the island-platform-only Bedford-Nostrand station of the 'G' line, at 14' 4"; the second-narrowest for them has to be Church Avenue (16') on the 'F'.
Now, keeping in mind what I said about specs . . . when the Astoria line's platforms were cut to conform to BMT specs, by the temporary platform edge alone the stations lost either 5 3/4" or 6 1/4" from the track center (but in any case, were now 5' 2" therefrom).
The differences between old and new in terms of platform specs were most jarring on the extensions of the old 1904 stations. They may have had to add on 1/2" to the rubbing boards of the new specs to conform to what the "old" specs were. |
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
BusTalk's Offical Welcoming Committee
Joined: 18 Dec 2007
Posts: 23060
Location: NEW JOISEY
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| Posted: Mon May 06, 2024 11:24 am Post subject: |
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W.B.:
Again, excellent information and stats; again, this subject is one I am sure that even many "serious" enthusiasts are not aware of.
Gap fillers......
I know the old South Ferry station had gap fillers (outer loop only), as did 14th Street and the TSQ end of the shuttle.
Now, I know that South Ferry is entirely out of the picture, being closed (for the second time)
What about the TSQ end of the shuttle?
Have the gap fillers there been eliminated with the massive station rebuilding, some years back?
Recall, also, there were gap fillers at the southern end of the Brooklyn-bound platform at Brooklyn Bridge......
"NYO"
["PLEASE KEEP CLEAR OF MOVING PLATFORM"] |
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
BusTalk's Offical Welcoming Committee
Joined: 18 Dec 2007
Posts: 23060
Location: NEW JOISEY
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W.B. Fishbowl
Age: 57
Joined: 02 Oct 2014
Posts: 2506
Location: New York, New York, USA
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
BusTalk's Offical Welcoming Committee
Joined: 18 Dec 2007
Posts: 23060
Location: NEW JOISEY
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| Posted: Mon May 06, 2024 12:17 pm Post subject: |
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W.B.:
Great photos/links; thanks for posting here.
OK, so now, with the gap fillers at the TSQ end of the shuttle gone, this would translate into the only station still utilizing them would be 14th Street (Lex)
I last rode the Shuttle in late 2003; the "Redbirds" had recently been retired, and Your's Truly would retire the following spring.
"62's" were then on the Shuttle.
I well recall in the early/mid-1980s when white-painted R-17s were assigned to the shuttle; I really liked the repainted interiors, which I thought were very much "in sync" with the era in which they debuted.
As a young kid, I was TOTALLY infatuated with "SAM" (the automated shuttle train); what a time I had in getting Mom to ride it......it was when a conductor told her that there was a motorman stationed in the cab, that FINALLY I got my wish......a NUMBER of times, that is, before "SAM's" untimely, fiery end in 1964.
In the late 1940's Bugs Bunny cartoon, "HURDY-GURDY HARE", Bugs, in once sequence, mugs as an old-time IRT "platform pusher", and, in an aside to the audience:
"I used to woik on the shuttle between Times Square and Grand Central!" (we then hear a classic, prewar "Eye-Are-Tee" air whistle shrieking!)
To this day, I refer to gap fillers as "pneumatic gates", as Mom did for many years; she was as fascinated by those at South Ferry as was Your's Truly, in his much, much younger days..............
"NYO"
["SHUTTLE TIMES SQUARE" |
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
BusTalk's Offical Welcoming Committee
Joined: 18 Dec 2007
Posts: 23060
Location: NEW JOISEY
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W.B. Fishbowl
Age: 57
Joined: 02 Oct 2014
Posts: 2506
Location: New York, New York, USA
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| Posted: Mon May 06, 2024 3:33 pm Post subject: |
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The entire Grand Central side had been rebuilt from scratch after the 1964 fire. The wooden platforms were replaced, of course, with concrete and steel ones, with the specs as I laid out several posts back. But amazing that, for a time, the '39 WF's did time on the shuttle.
["GRAND-CENTRAL"] |
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NEW YORK OMNIBUS 2629
BusTalk's Offical Welcoming Committee
Joined: 18 Dec 2007
Posts: 23060
Location: NEW JOISEY
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| Posted: Mon May 06, 2024 3:48 pm Post subject: |
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W.B.:
The 1938/1939 WF cars, in fact, DID look a mite out of place on the TSQ-GC shuttle (I also caught the hyphen between "GRAND" and "CENTRAL" on the roller curtain)
The TSQ end of the Shuttle still sticks out quite prominently in my mind; I recall as a kid the always-busy NEDICK'S, where Mom and I enjoyed many a juicy frank (mustard and relish!) and a icy orange drink, while breathing in the intoxicating smells of the trains, and listening to the screeching wheels....now THAT'S dining "ambience" at its best!
Man, it's all so long ago now......'
"NYO"
["SHUTTLE TRAINS TO GRAND CENTRAL"] |
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