The New York Rapid-transit Subway

26 PAKSONS ON NEW YORK RAPID-TRANSIT SUBWAY. [Minutes of Brooklyn Bridge. 14th Street Grand Central Station . 72nd Street 96th Street 30 „ 20 „ 18 „ The same general method of reaching island platforms has been used at Brooklyn Bridge, 14th Street, and Grand Central stations. The rail-level is placed low enough to permit of the construction of a passage-way beneath the surface of the street over the trains. The minimum height inside passage-ways of this description has been taken at 7 feet 6 inches, so that the minimum depth of rail- level to accommodate the passage-way and its street-floor is about 25 feet, which is substantially the distance at the three stations. Figs. 17, Plate 6, showing the Grand Central station are also illustrative of the others, and show the methods of approach to the overhead passages and of descent from the passages to the platforms. These Figures also show one of two extraordinary pieces of con- struction. In order to make a curve that would be feasible in work- ing, it was necessary to acquire an easement under private property at the corner of Park Avenue and 42nd Street. This property was far too valuable to be left unimproved even for that part over the railway. A hotel with twenty-two stories was projected on the site, and plans were drawn for the railway to occupy a part of the basement. In order to prevent vibration from being felt in tlie hotel above, the steel columns carrying the latter pass through the railway roof to their own foundations, being set in line with, but quite independent of, the subway-columns. The other piece of similar construction, at Times Square, was even more extreme. In this case the subway passes directly through the building, wliich was not only built above the railway but also beneath it. The basement below lias a height of 22 feet, sufficient for two stories, though occupied as one by the press-room of the New York Times. As with the hotel, the building and the railway are separate structures. Either can be removed without afiecting the other. The railway easement secures a certain height, beginning at an established distance beneath the street, and terminating at a second distance, all rights above and below being retained by the property. At 72nd Street advantage was taken of a parkway in the street, from which staircases run directly, from a station-building on the surface, to the two platforms, so that the express station at this point has its platform only 14 feet below the surface of the street, or substantially the standard local-station distance.