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| Re: Nassau Street Loop (559962) | |||
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Re: Nassau Street Loop |
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Posted by RedbirdR33 on Sun Jan 27 15:05:31 2008, in response to Nassau Street Loop, posted by geoffc on Sun Jan 27 11:38:00 2008. Geo: Its not a silly question. New York's transit terminology can be confusing. It is a loop if we describe a loop as a half circle and not a full circle. A train entering such a loop makes a 180 degrees turn and reversing direction without changing ends. The City Hall and South Ferry Loops that you mention above are cases in point.A more expansive definition of loops can be found in the Dual Contract subways proposals for the BRT. (later the BMT)The proposals described the BMT rail lines as forming three loops from Queens and Eastern Brooklyn running through Manhattan and returning to Southern Brooklyn. If you lay the subway map on the floor and look down at it its easier to visualize this. The largest of the loops is the Broadway Line. BMT trains from Queens enter Manhattan via the 60th Street Tunnel run down Broadway and return to Brooklyn via the Montague Street Tunnel, as an alternative the express trains can return to Brooklyn via the Manhattan Bridge. (Until 1967 these trains used the tracks on the north side of the bridge, since then they use the tracks on the south side. The next loop would have been the Centre Street Line. These trains from eastern Brooklyn entered Manhattan via the Williamsburg Bridge and ran down Centre Street to Chambers Street and returned to Brooklyn via the Brooklyn Bridge. The third loop would have come up from southern Brooklyn and crossed the East River via the tracks on the south side of the Manhattan Bridge. Upon reaching Manhattan the tracks turned southward into Chambers Street Station. They would have continued south along Williams Street and returned to Brooklyn via the aforementioned Montague Street Tunnel. Chambers Street Station was actually built as two separate two tracks stations side by side. Since it was intended that the two westernmost tracks (Centre St Loop) would return to Brooklyn via the Brooklyn Bridge they rise to a higher level than the two eastern tracks at the south end of the station. Of course the connection from Chambers Stree to the Brooklyn Bridge was never completed. What happened to the Williams Street Line? Once the BMT crossed the East River and reached Chambers Street Station they found that the IRT had already built a line on Williams Street. (The one that used by today's 2 and 3 trains to reach the Clark Street Tunnel.) Eventually the BMT decided to run trains south of Chambers Street using Nassau Street. This accounts for the wide swing to the west of the BMT Line south of Chambers Street Station. This swing is especially noticeable in your riding a northbound train. The track configuration at Chambers Street was changed into a more conventional arrangement with southbound trains using the two western tracks while northbound trains use the two eastern tracks. The two center tracks merge into a single tail track south of the station. This track runs underneath the southbound track to a point just north of the IRT at Beekman Street. It is used for turning midday M trains. Today the entire line from Essex Street south to Broad Street is commonly refered to as the "Nassau Street Line". (Used by J,M and Z) For many years it was usual to refer to the section between Essex Street and Chambers Sreet as the "Centre Street Line or Loop" while the section between Chambers Street and Broad Street was refered to as the "Nassau Street Line or Loop". Larry, RedbirdR33 |
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