Evolution

The Subway began in Oct. 1904 as a 9.1 mile long worm curling between City Hall and 145th St.

It grew into an octopus whose 240 miles of tentacles now reach into every borough.

Well over 3.5 million people now travel its 722 miles of tracks daily, more than a billion people a year. They ride inside an immense machine that is alive. It breathes, feeds and excretes, rumbles and screeches. It is an organ inside that even more complicated organism, the city.

X-Ray the subway and you will discover the intertwined skeletons of three separate systems. Each had a different origin and youth. Each cherished its own ambition, had successes and met adversity. Finally the three fused. The subway is a union of the IRT, BMR and IND, three originally independent and autonomous systems.

The Interborough Rapid Transit Company was the original subway. The IRT's boss, August Belmont built that initial 9 mile stretch between 1900 and 1904. But then the digging, laying tracks, and adding on of elevated lines continued.

The IRT tunneled into the Bronx, Brooklyn and Queens. Thus, for example, when, on 24 Sept 1907, Jackson Ave. in Queens was linked to Grand Central station, a 40 minute ride with trolley and ferry was reduced to 4 minutes.

The "DUAL SYSTEM" was the creation of the three member Transit Committee of the Broad of Estimates. It entrusted two competing companies with the task of expanding and separately operating the subway. Two contracts were handed out. The city committed itself to providing $152 million towards the construction. The IRT had to contribute $70 million. The BRT's share was $60 million. The two contractors received 49 year leases and were committed to a nickel fare. A recapture feature allowed the city to gain control of the lines after 10 years of operation.

Contracts #3 and #4 were signed on March 19, 1913. Seven years later New York had a mass transit operation that surpassed London's. By 1920 the Dual System had given New York 201.8 route miles of subway and elevated tracks. London had 156 miles. Chicago's 70.9, and Paris had 59.4.6 miles of tracks.

THE BMT, the Brooklyn-Manhattan Transit Corp., was originally the Brooklyn Rapid Transit Company. The BRT had been operating els, but in 1911 it began lobbying for the contract to build Brooklyn's 4th Avenue underground line, which was to run into Manhattan. By securing that contract the BRT broke the IRT's monopoly. Thereafter New York had two subway companies. At first the BRT was very successful. It widened its tunnels, introduced excellent 67 foot long all steel cars and proved popular. The line was profitable. But then in Nov 1918 there was  an accident that cost 97 lives. Inflation cut into the value of the nickel fare. Hard times set in. In 1923, the BRT had to be reorganized and became the Brooklyn-Manhattan Transit Company, or BMT.

THE INDependent was the third separate organization to dig tunnels and acquire carriages and to run a subway in NYC. Work on its first leg, the 8th Ave. line, began in March 1925, and opened on 10 September 1932 . This operation was unique in that, while the other two were private business owned by shareholders and run for profit, the IND was owned by the city. Its workers were municipal employees. The Dual System had become a trio.

Across four decades the subway was a largely private rail system wherein three companies competed. The IRT, BMT and IND each had their own bosses, operated different cars, used different tunnels, and ran on tracks that did not interconnect. It was not possible to transfer from an IRT train to the BMT or IND line. Like Burger King, McDonalds and White Castle, which all sell hamburgers, the three subway lines provided a similar product at the same price, yet they were competitors. That changed in 1940.

UNIFICATION came in June 1940. The city bought the  property of the IRT for $151 million and that of the BMT for $175 million. The IRT's 15,000 workers and the BMT's 13,000 became civil servants, like the employees of the IND. The managerial walls between the three systems were torn down and their tunnels, tracks and stations were gradually connected to one another. It became possible to transfer and change from one line to another, all for the same nickel. The system now had 35,000 employees and a $60 million payroll. It was used by 71% of New Yorkers and provided 1.8 billion rides a year. It was the subway we know today. Mayor Fiorello Laguardia had pushed  the merger through and it was he who, as Motorman #1, was at the controls of the train that inaugurated the unified New York City Transit System.