Brooklyn Bridge-City Hall (IRT Lexington Avenue Line station)
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Manhattan
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Template:NYCS station rowOctober 27, 1904
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Brooklyn Bridge-City Hall is an express station with two island platforms, located on Park Row at the Manhattan end of the Brooklyn Bridge. It is the south terminal for the Template:NYCS 6 service, which turns around via the City Hall loop. Just north of the station are crossovers that allow trains to switch between the local and express tracks; these are used during the night so Lexington Avenue Local trains can continue south (as the local tracks end just to the south, looping at the abandoned City Hall. Due to the closure of City Hall station in 1945, Brooklyn Bridge-City Hall (which had simply been Brooklyn Bridge) became the southernmost station on normal Lexington Avenue Local service.
South of the station, the downtown local track splits into three tracks. The westmost loops around to the northbound local track through City Hall station. The other two are layup tracks parallel to the downtown express track. Until the 1960s, they merged into the downtown express track north of Fulton Street, but now they are spurs ending a little north of Fulton Street, occasionally used for train storage. Plans are on the books to rejoin the layup tracks to the express track.
The station has been recently renovated, with new tile and ADA-compliant elevator access. It is the zero point for the IRT East Side Chain; mile 0 is at the south end of the station.
The Brooklyn Bridge station has a number of abandoned areas as construction and service patterns have required changes to be made to the station. In addition to the two existing island platforms, there are two short local platforms on the outer edges of the station. Like those at 14th Street-Union Square and 96th Street, these local platforms were built to accommodate extra passenger volume and were built to the five-car length of the original Template:IRT local trains. These side platforms did not see much use as they were located at express stations that required transfer via the island platforms, and, as trains were lengthened to their current ten-car length, it was impractical to lenghten both these small side platforms and the island platforms. They were closed in 1910 after only six years in operation and walled off along the platform edges.
The side platform on the southbound side is now home to some electrical equipment and a backup control tower for the Brooklyn Bridge interlocking, just north of the station. The tower is functional but not normally used, because the 42nd Street-Grand Central tower is the primary control point for the whole line. The interlocking board can be seen through a window along the wall along the southbound local trackway. The south end of the downtown side platform is still visible near the dispatcher's booth on the downtown island platform.
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There are also some closed portions at the south ends of the existing express platforms. During the station lengthening projects it was easier to lengthen the express platform to the north. The curves at the south end proved impossible to rework so the station was lengthened northward (allowing Worth Street to be abandoned), and the curved southern ends of the express platform closed. Gap fillers and original mosaic tiles remain in the closed ends.
Artwork includes a 1996 work by Mark Gibian titled Cable Crossing.
External links
- NYCsubway.org - IRT East Side Brooklyn Bridge Station (http://nycsubway.org/irt/eastside/irt-eastside-bkbr.html) (text used with permission)