173 also had the modified paint scheme, and is here running south as a put-in for the 125th Crosstown, here on Amsterdam Avenue around 152nd Steet. Possibly someone will identify the church and provide a more exact location.
I believe ths rather poor photo is on St. Nicholous Svenue around 160th Street. The car was in K service, but without a proper sign.
With a proper sign, further north on Broadway, around 190th Street, looking north.
On West 181st, just east of Broadway, was the double-track, sizzors-crossover terminal for four Bronx streetcar lines, the "O" Ogden Avenue, turning south on Ogdan Avenue after crossing the "Washington Bridge," including a steep hill descent, then running west over the McCumbs Dam or 155th Street Bridge back into Manhattan to 155th and Amsterdam, a U-shaped rout on its side or C-shaped rout reversed. Five 301-400 series cars were normally assigned to the line, because their dynamic brakes helped on the grade. Note the practically identacle architecture of the 101-200-series cars, built from lengthened single-truck cars, and the all-new bodies for the 301-400's. The X ex-Manhattan car is on the 167th crosstown; the Z 180th Street used convertables up to busing. The car in the distance is one of the second-hand cars also on the 167th X. The U University Avenue also ran here, and was the 4th line. The Z ran north on university with the U until reaching the Treemont Avenue.
I was successful in posting one photo with each posting. I will now try mutliple photos.
Third & Amsterdam car on 125th Street, March '47.
398 on the "T" at 125th and Amsterdam, using the double-track Wye to run north on Amsterdam, having come from Park Row on Third. As I mentioned the top five of the 301-400 series were originally conduit cars as here shown.
400 also had this slightly different paint scheme. There is a feeble atttempt at an "X" in chalk on the blank sign, hard to see, with the car running on the 125th Crosstown, here at St. Nicholous Avenue
David, my wife Lady Firestorm thanks you so much for those Yonkers photos! Her father grew up in Yonkers on Nepperhan Avenue and were he still with us I'm sure he'd have lots of stories to tell about those streetcars. Her father was quite the railfan as well, I'm sure you would have enjoyed each other's company.
Ashburton, Warburton, Palisade Avenue, Sawmill River Parkway, Park Avenue, Nepperhan, she knows them all.
There's an identical car to the one in the museum in Vienna in the tram museum in Crich in the U.K. They have a small line but a big collection of vehicles.
And here we are at Fordham Road and The Grand Concourse with one of the 101-series lightweights that replaced convertables on the 207th-Street-Fordham Road Crosstown. (All "Crosstowns," 42nd* St., 59th St.*, 125th St.*, 138th St., 149th St.**, 163rd St., !67-169th St., 207th ST. displayed "X." 180th St. was an exception, "Z", because it shared West 181st St. with the 167th in Washington Heights, Manhattan, both lines running mostly in The Bronx. "O" Ogden Avneue and "U" University Avenue also used West 181st St. "T" was used for Treemont Avenue, which also ran Crosstown. But west of Webster Avenue, in The Bronx, the "Z" actually used Treemont Avenue, and the "T" Treemont Avnue used Burnside Avenue! Starred lines are conduit lines. The double-starred 149th Street Crosstown used trolley wire in The Bronx and conduit on West 145th Street in Manhattan, with the plow-pit on the Manhattan side of the bridge at the east side of Lenox Avenue. Other lines used only trolley wire.
The Fordham Road Station of the Jerome Avenue structure is in the background.
Likewise, one of the five 301-series that had been used on hilly Ogdon Avenue in-part replaced convertables on the "C" "Bronx and Van Courtland Parks" line, here photographed at 238th and Broadway. Second-hand lightweights from the University Avenue line completed the replacement. The "C" was bussed shortly after this late 1947 photo, but the track was maintained servicable for about a year as one of the two connections between the Yonkers and Westchester lines and the remaining lines in The Bronx.
And at the end of its New York Citiy career, in 1948, a now pole-equipped 101-series replaced much older Brill convertables on the "A" Westchester Avenue line. Some of these cars ended up in Bombay.
Before the introduction of the Huffliner Peter-Witt-doors 551-625 series in 1937 and 1938, the new 101-200 series was introduced to "B" Broadway - 42nd Street in 1936. By the end of 1938, they had all been transfered to "T" Third-and-Amsterdam Avenue and the "K" (for Kingsbridge) Amsterdam Ave. & Broadway, with a few on 10th Avenue. Here is a 1936 photo on 42nd Street:
And Jack May or another friend send me a photo of one preserved in a Vienna museum:
Ditto, side view:
And a Spring 1960 photo in the Floresdorf section of Vienna:
And here is a 626-685 series car being demonstrated to possible new users, probably officials from Vienna, in 1948, a Treemont Avenue line car being demonstrated on the Southern Boulevard line at 169th St. in The Bronx.
Great shots, Dave. Thanks for sharing!
The fan-trip also covered the seldom-used short half-way connecting link between the single-track 5 and 6, with a grade crossing as shown with the Central's Putnam Division.
The 5 line, Neperhan Avenue, was also single track, and here is a gethering of the two fan-trip cars and a regular service car:
Here is a view from the rear window of the first car of a two-car fantrip on Warturton Avenue, the northern portion of the "1" line in Yonkers, with the trolley-wire southbound departure contactor and the Nashod signal visible. Single-track-with-passing sidings was typical in Yonkers, not in New York City.
Dave- Very glad these photo postings are working out for you. It brings a whole new dimension to your posts. Keep it coming.
Here we are at the Foot of Main Street, near the NYCentral's Yonkers Station and the Yonkers Carhouse.
The 301-400 series were like the 101-200, except that the body was all new, not extended from low-floor single-truck cars. They also introduced blended dynamic braking. All were assigned to Yonkers and the New Rochelle-subway line, where they ended up providing all service, except for five that were assigned to Ogden Avenue, the one very hilly Bronx route, and five that were initially conduit cars (396-400) assigned to Manhattan.
Here is the transfer (but no free transfer) between the northern end of the Broadway subway line at 242st & Broadway, Van Courtland Park, and the southern terminal of the 1, 2, 3 Yonkers lines. The Bronx C line ran through at this point, from West Farms Square in central Bronx to Broadway and 262nd Street, City Line,
More Third Avenue Lightweight car pix
138th St. Crosstown, after ex-Manhattan cars replaced the Brill Convertables:
640, one of the conduit cars built for 59th Street crosstown, serving on Third and Amsterdam, the "T" after 59th went bus 1 Oct. '46. Here across from City Hall on Park Row, the track from the original NY&Harlem of 1832, shared between Green Lines and Third Ave unitl Green went bus in 1936. This car did see service in The Bronx with trolley poles for a year before its trip to Vienna.
Patrik Waldon provided the photo evidence for the third door added.
Jack May informed me that the 72nd Crosstown bus was "6" in the Fifth Avenue Coach Lines System. "6" was also used by NY Omnibus for Broadway from South Ferry to Times Square and 7th to 59th Street.
Two corrections: 1. The third, the rear exit door, was added to the Sao Paulo ex-Third Avenue Peter-Witt double-end lightweights while they were in service. 2. The revised route of the 72nd Street Crosstown bus is west on 72nd from Riverside to Central Park West. south to the 66th Street Park Transverse Road and then back 5th to 72nd and then east. It is now the M72. Was 6 or 7 when run by 5th Avenue.
Amazing. There's nothing new under the sun, is there?
That's one of the things I've always loved about being a student of history, never underestimate the imagination and sophistication of the old-timers, they'll surprise you every time.
Have a look at this for info about the first Hybrid car designed in 1900 by Ferdinand Porsche.
http://press.porsche.com/news/release.php?id=642
Excerpt from NY Times, April 14, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/14/nyregion/subway-that-started-it-all-100-years-later-faded-traces-city-s-original-remain.html
Amid the daily scrum of the New York City subway, few ever go looking for the past. Rushing to work or home, from one appointment to the next, riders scurry past mysterious doors that lead nowhere, walled off platforms and stairwells, faded sections of tile and other odd artifacts of history without a second glance or thought.
But this being the subway's centennial year, Joseph Brennan and Joseph Cunningham, a pair of transit buffs, agreed the other day to lead a small band in search of the original 1904 subway.
Mr. Brennan, 52, who lives in South Orange, N.J., helps administer the e-mail system at Columbia University but has never outgrown his childhood fascination with trains. A few years ago, in his spare time, he put together a Web site detailing the history of the city's abandoned subway stations.
http://www.columbia.edu/~brennan/
Excerpt from article Local Bus Routes of Manhattan by Joe Brennan
http://www.nycsubway.org/wiki/Local_Bus_Routes_of_Manhattan
From nycsubway.oThe Fifth Avenue system, which ultimately became MABSTOA, was started in 1886 with a horse omnibus line from 89th St via Fifth Avenue and West Broadway to Bleecker Street. Electric buses were used from about 1898 and later of course gasoline and diesel buses. It was the only motor bus company in the city until 1916. Fifth Avenue was the only major street in Manhattan that never had a street railway, because the politically connected residents prevented it, and the bus line charged twice the fare of street railways as a class distinction.
Operating companies of the Fifth Ave bus system were "Fifth Avenue Transportation Company (Limited)" 1885-1895, foreclosed, then "Fifth Avenue Coach Company" 1897-1954. The holding companies, the real power, were quite a tangle, and note the incorporations in different states. "New York Electrical Vehicle Transportation Company" (inc NJ) 1899-1936 took control in 1899, and changed its name to "New York Transportation Company" 1902. NYT was itself controlled as of 1922 by "Fifth Avenue Bus Securities Corporation" (inc DE) 1922-1936. That was in turn controlled by "The Omnibus Corporation" 1923-present (inc DE), which was named "Chicago Motor Coach Corporation" up to 1924 and named "The Hertz Corporation" since 1954 (yes, the automobile rental company). It came to light many years later that the Omnibus Corp was controlled by General Motors interests. This takes us to 1954.
The larger of the two Manhattan streetcar systems was the Metropolitan Street Railway system, approximately 1893-1911, which was a bit of a house of cards that broke up in part after bankruptcy in 1908. The core company became the New York Railways system, which passed to "New York Railways Corporation" 1925-1936, which was controlled by "Fifth Avenue Coach Company" (and therefore ultimately by General Motors). NYR acquired control of "Manhattan Surface Coach Company" 1925-unknown, named "New York City Omnibus Corporation" from 1930 to 1956. The streetcar lines were converted to bus in 1936, when NYR was liquidated and control of NYCO passed to Fifth Ave Coach and The Omnibus Corp. So as of 1936 the Fifth Ave and NYC Omnibus systems were under common control.
https://archive.org/stream/greatbusstrike00huberich#page/4/mode/2up
I was using the term "hybrid" in a general (and probably incorrect) sense. The gas-electric system's easy enough to understand though, use a gasolene engine to drive a generator that supplies current to traction motors. Much easier than designing a mechanical transmission, especially if the top speed isn't going to be too fast.
That was the idea behind the St. Chamond tank, have the tracks driven by electric motors. The top speed didn't have to be any faster than a man could go at a fast walk, and it also made training tank drivers much easier.
I didn't know gas-electric street vehicles went back as far as 1911, or earlier, although I know Edison had electric cars (battery powered) even earlier.
Interestingly, Public Service Coordinated Transport of New Jersey operated gas-electric vehicles called "All Service Vehicles" or "ASV's" from the late 30's through the 40's. Also called "trolley buses" they ran off overhead trolley wires where available and off gasolene-powered generators where not.
For a closer look, try this...
http://www.trolleybuses.net/psct/psct.htm
A roster, and then scroll down the page for more photos of ASV's to click on than you'll know what to do with! Have a ball!
Firelock76 Looks like someone was using hybrid vehicles commercially long before it was cool!
not hybrid --no energy storage for traction. The battery was for lighting, and I do not remember if they succeeded in using regeneration from the traction motor(s) to charge it; I think it was only charged off the traction generator (but every night it would appear the battery was taken out, replaced with a 'full' one, and completely charged for the next day - smart man, that Green.
I wonder if they got the idea from the French St. Chamond tank of World War One?
Much more likely the other way around, unless the St. Chamond was designed well before 1911... I thought it was interesting that the twin-motor GE 'differentialless' bus drive was developed before GE's first large-scale development of gas-electric railcars.
I was going through that article and...
"Gasolene-electric omnibuses."
Interesting. Looks like someone was using hybrid vehicles commercially long before it was cool!
Buslisti've never seen any evidence of GM involvement in the Omnibus corporation owner of both FAAC and CMC as well as other properties.
Somewhere in here we will find the actual relationship.
See article in the July 8th, 1925 New York Times, for example.
As I understand it, the link is more between Ritchie and Green and the manufacturing part of the Fifth Avenue company ... Green having left, gone to take over in Chicago, then coming back in when Hertz et al. took over Fifth Avenue to form Omnibus ... and not involving GM management of the bus companies themselves (I believe Omnibus then had Chicago, New York, and St. Louis service running). I don't believe GM at that time had interest in running actual services; they only wanted the expert distinctive competence of the design and construction 'divisions'. Note that this is almost a decade before Austin and the angle drive/monocoque body buses would so revolutionize the industry and, not incidentally, make NCL such a 'winning' proposition for GM and others from the late '30s on.
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