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| Re: Abandoned Utica Ave Upper Level (Pix Coming Soon) & 76th Street Saga (1130895) | |||
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Re: Abandoned Utica Ave Upper Level (Pix Coming Soon) & 76th Street Saga |
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Posted by Dupont Circle Station on Mon Jan 9 16:16:49 2012, in response to Re: Abandoned Utica Ave Upper Level (Pix Coming Soon) & 76th Street Saga, posted by tunnelrat on Mon Jan 9 10:12:39 2012. An oldtimer at Cord Meyer told me back in the 1980s that when they were excavating for the Continental and the one diagonally across 108th in 1960 they broke through into a tunnel. It was definitely IND construction going by the tunnel walls, catwalks and supporting columns. Had 2 trackways but no sign that rails or signals had ever been installed. There was wall lighting installed but not operating. The roadbed sloped down in the direction of the mainline and they estimated it would have gone under the mainline tracks. No way to tell if it would have followed the mainline or crossed and continued down Continental...it ended abruptly in bare concrete in the intersection of 108th & 71st.TA could only find a water-damaged inspection report from 1942 that listed it as a "utility corridor" but the rest of the records were beyond recognition. The city's land records showed there was a tunnel there, but not of the extent it was (they hit it when they were making new cuts into the street for service line connections). The city, ConEd and NYTel came along within a few months to fill it with a sewer line and all sorts of cabling. The excess space was filled in. There was no mistaking it as being anything but subway tunnel, almost certainly constructed along with the QB mainline. (No way was it merely a "utility corridor" as it was clearly a sibling of the 2-track IND segments.) Why it was there no one could figure out since there never was any official plan for a subway in 108th Street. Some of the speculation was it could have been used for construction equipment or layup tracks they changed their minds about (though that didn't make sense to me because the orientation would be to/from Jamaica or crossing QB, not trains from Manhattan terminating at Continental). Another rumor was it was for a spur off the Astoria/Horace Harding line. IAE it was gone and pretty much forgotten about by 1962. We'll probably never know why it was built. However, the inattention to preserving documentation at the TA and BoT apparently was SOP. I certainly won't say that the city not being able to explain why that 2 block stretch of tunnel was there and apparently forgotten about for almost 20 years, is any kind of proof that Pitkin was actually built to 76th Street. However, knowing how records weren't always given the TLC they need, it is possible the files are incomplete and speculation will run rampant about 76th Street until either the missing paperwork is found, or someone actually digs into Pitkin & 76th and does or does not find a station shell there (and posts clear photographic proof of whatever they find). While I think it's intriguing and that it would be neat to find The Lost Station, I am sick and tired of hearing the same anecdotal stories about it existing with no *hard* evidence to back it up. I can't believe that not one person here knows someone who works for the city or a utility with lines in that area they cannot prevail upon to give us some photos or reflective mapping of what's under that street. Or, for one of the badass urban explorers just take it upon themselves to somehow get under there themselves. |
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