Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site fortune.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!mgnetp!ihnp4!fortune!burton From: burton@fortune.UUCP Newsgroups: net.railroad Subject: Re: Dade Co. Metrorail Opens - (nf) Message-ID: <3623@fortune.UUCP> Date: Mon, 18-Jun-84 19:09:51 EDT Article-I.D.: fortune.3623 Posted: Mon Jun 18 19:09:51 1984 Date-Received: Fri, 22-Jun-84 09:12:05 EDT Sender: notes@fortune.UUCP Organization: Fortune Systems, Redwood City, CA Lines: 30 #R:inmet:7900003:fortune:8900014:000:1308 fortune!burton Jun 18 12:41:00 1984 I don't know about Chicago, but I **do** know a lot about the old BMT and predecessor systems/lines of the New Yrok subway system. The Brighton line (now the D, QB, et al) was originally a steam road, as was the Sea Beach (N) and the West End (B, T). The Brooklyn & Queens Transit, Brooklyhn & Manhattan Transit after the malbone Street wreck in 1918, was a product of mergers. Brooklyn had a well-developed system of steam roads, for internal use and to take people from the then-separate city of New York (pre-unification) to Coney Island. Originally the Sea Beach line ran to the Brooklyn waterfront. As a child, I remember seeing the old surface right-of-way of the West End line just below the El. Much of the impetus for upgrading the steam lines to Els came from the Dual Contracts, signed by the Citty of New York with the IRT and BMT co. about 1914, whereby the City would fund the construction/upgrading of most of the lines that became the BMT and IRT. For more information, contact the Electric Railroaders' Association, which has/had a reprint of the Dual Contracts book for sale. Philip Burton 101 Twin Dolphin Drive-MS 133 Fortune Systems Redwood City, CA 94065 (415) 595-8444 x 526 - - - {ihnp4 [ucbvax | decvax!decwrl]!amd70 harpo hpda }!fortune!burton