NOTE--This was one of two transit history columns I wrote as an "audition" for an Upper West Side weekly. The publisher originally wanted me to write two a month. When she changed their tune and said she couldn't pay me for them, I told her I wasn't interested--RG
By Raanan Geberer
Once, elevated lines traversed Manhattan. We had
four of them: the 9th Avenue El, the 6th Avenue El, the 3rd
Avenue El and the 2nd Avenue El. One could look out the window (or,
if you were daring, from one of the wooden elevated cars’ open platforms) and
see City Hall, the Financial District, the Empire State Building, the great
department stores and more. And as the trains rattled through the old tenement
districts, you could actually see through people’s windows.
The last of the Manhattan els, the 3rd
Avenue El, was torn down in 1955, although a portion in the Bronx lasted until
1973. Transit riders today, unfortunately, don’t have the experience of seeing
Manhattan from a moving train – well, almost. There are several elevated
stations in Manahttan today – three at the northern tip of Manhattan, and the
125th Street station on the Number 1 line.
Tourists are often surprised that the 1 train comes
out of the tunnel for one stop at 125th, and even longtime city dwellers who
are used to it sometimes wonder why this is so. It turns out that the train
doesn’t climb to the surface at all. It stays totally on a level grade, says
Charles Seaton, a spokesman for MTA New York City Transit.
What changes is the topography. At 125th,
we are in the middle of the Manhattan Valley, a
natural depression running east to west across Manhattan. For the line to stay
underground, the transit planners of the early 1900s would have had to put it
in a deep tunnel with steep approaches and descents at either end. Building an
elevated viaduct allowed the line to stay at grade.
And what a viaduct! Its centerpiece is an arch that
the Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) has called “a testament to the
skills of the engineers and contractors who built New York’s first subway
between 1900 and 1904" and “the most imposing and visually impressive
above-ground engineering structure of the IRT subway system.” The station
itself sits right above the arch.
The arch was built both for aesthetic reasons and to
avoid obstructing traffic at the busy intersection of 125th and
Broadway, according to information provided by the LPC’s Elisabeth de Bourbon.
And while the construction of the underground sections of the subway took place
out of the public’s sight, the building of the viaduct drew large crowds of
spectators. In 1981, the LPC declared the viaduct a New York City landmark, and
in 1983 it was placed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Today, says Seaton, the station serves the northern
part of Columbia University, the New York City Housing Authority’s Grant
Houses, the 125th Street shopping district, Grant’s Tomb and more. It is in
walking distance of both the revived Cotton
Club, named after the 1920s and ‘30s-era Harlem nightclub that helped
launch the careers of Duke Ellington and Cab Calloway; and the Old Broadway Synagogue,
the last remaining European-Jewish synagogue in Harlem.
Because it is in such a busy
location, it is also fairly heavily used. In 2012, according to the MTA, it had
2,560,513 riders and was the 181st most-heavily used station in
the transit system, out of 468 stops.
Today, when you’re riding on
the Number 1 train and look out the window just north or south of the 125th
Street station, you’ll see a varied streetscape – once-elegant old apartment
houses, the projects, the shopping district, garages, warehouses and more.
These vistas may change in
the future, in this ever-changing city. But to riders on the Number 1 line, the
train’s “coming up for air” (even though it stays at grade level) will continue
to be a welcome relief.
