In 1877, the Brooklyn, Flatbush and Coney Island Railway was incorporated, opening the next year in 1878. It originally ran from the Prospect Park entrance at Flatbush and Ocean Avenues south to the Brighton Beach Hotel, built near the water’s edge. The BF&CI wanted to find a way to get its trains closer to downtown Brooklyn. Since a route through Prospect Park was impossible in this pre-subway era, it was decided to build a trench through the hill at Crown Heights (then known as Crow Hill) and run the line below grade, connecting with the Long Island Rail Road tracks at Atlantic Avenue. A contractural agreement with the LIRR allowed BF&CI trains to share its trackage along Atlantic Avenue and the LIRR terminal at Flatbush and Atlantic Avenues, so the BF&CI turned left at Atlantic Avenue.
After 1882, when the LIRR took over a BF&CI competitor, the New York and Manhattan Beach Railroad, it found itself competing with itself for suburban railroad customers. The NY&MB had been created by LIRR chief Austin Corbin before that railroading giant assumed control of the LIRR, and accordingly, the LIRR evicted the BF&CI from its trackage at the end of 1883 after just six years in service. BF&CI service was truncated to the Bedford Terminal at Franklin and Atlantic Avenues, where there was a turntable for turning the steam engines.
No longer having a desirable northern terminal, the BF&CI was forced into bankruptcy and was reorganized in 1887 as the Brooklyn and Brighton Beach Railroad. The next year the Brighton Beach Hotel was moved inland–-by railroad–-to keep it from slipping into the sea. In 1896, the problem of what to do with the northern end of the line was solved when a ramp was built to connect new Kings County Elevated that ran along Fulton Street to the Brooklyn & Brighton Beach from a junction at Franklin and Fulton, bridging Atlantic Avenue and connecting to the Brighton several blocks south of that point. The Fulton elevated ran from downtown Brooklyn over Fulton Street out to Jamaica and was completed in 1893; the connection with the Brooklyn & Brighton Beach completed in 1896 was built to carry the B&BB over its old partner, the LIRR, which was still operating at grade along Atlantic Avenue. This portion of the LIRR was itself submerged in a tunnel under this part of the avenue from 1903-1905. In 1896, the same year the B&BB was leased to the Kings County Elevated, a new entity was created to unite Brooklyn’s surface and elevated lines: the Brooklyn Rapid Transit Company, the BRT.
Beginning in 1905, the Brighton Beach was brought to its present-day arrangement by eliminating all grade crossings. The northern part would be on an elevated structure; south of about Prospect Place, trains would run in an open cut; and south of Foster Avenue, trains would run on an embankment created from land excavated to submerge the Bay Ridge Branch of the LIRR in its own open cut. Many cross streets would be depressed to travel under the embankment, but some would stop at the embankment, vexing travelers to this day. Brighton Beach BRT service continued along the parallel LIRR Manhattan Beach branch while the grade crossing elimination project was underway.
None shall pass! Avenue I, seen here at East 15th Street with a BMT Q traveling along the Brighton, is one of those interrupted avenues, along with Avenue H and Avenue X. Thankfully, most east-west routes are depressed beneath the Brighton embankment.
For more on the Brighton and its cousin, the Franklin Shuttle, see this FNY page, a golden oldie from 1999.
Also see: King of the Rails Art Huneke’s Brighton page.
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5/15/24
7 comments
The 1905 Brighton Line alignment and track layout was quite different than today’s. After 1896 the Brighton Line used today’s two track Franklin Shuttle route between the old Fulton St. elevated and today’s Prospect Park Station. In 1907, south of Prospect Park the line was widened from two to four tracks as part of the grade crossing eliminations. Beginning in 1913, the BRT underwent a massive expansion as part of NYC’s Dual Contracts projects, which vastly expanded subway service between Manhattan and Brooklyn, Queens, and The Bronx. The Brighton Line, already four tracks wide south of Prospect Park, gained a new route to Manhattan north of Prospect Park using a new subway tunnel under Flatbush Ave. and a new East River crossing – the Manhattan Bridge. This work was underway in November 1918 when a southbound Brighton Line train derailed entering the Prospect Park station, killing nearly 100 people. This disaster, the Malbone Street Wreck caused NYC to change that street’s name to Empire Boulevard. The current tunnel route north of Prospect Park was completed in 1920 and is still in use.
I used to live near there. At Ave H traffic runs into a dead end but there is a pedestrian underpass and there is the old railway station still in use. A few blocks away right off coney Island Ave betw Foster and Glenwood is a little dirt road labeled Corbin Pl. Evidently named for the LIRR exec Austin Corbin who was, let us recall, a vicious antisemite who built the hotel in Brighton Beach to which his railroad line ran but which excluded Jews and was the secretary of the Society To Suppress Jews. He was an advocate of genocide.
When bicycling in the area I found that Avenue H ramp handy.
That’s Corbin Court. Corbin Place is in Sheepshead Bay and was also named for Austin Corbin, until the City found another, less problematic Corbin to name it after (thus avoiding the expense of new street signs etc.).
I lived on East 9th Street between H & Foster from 1980 until 1991. It was a great neighborhood to grow up in indeed.
Was there ever really a hill or Heights in Crown Heights or was that always just a real estate sales gimmick? Walking around there the area seems extremely flat, even for Brooklyn.
I remember this perspective of this photo well, as my grandparents lived on E15th Street between Avenue I and J. The Brighton Line ran on the aforementioned embankment just beyond the fence in their backyard. Unfortunately after my grandpa had a sudden fall during the late 1990s, they had to move from their house to an apartment as he couldn’t manage the steps. I still have fond memories of the Brighton Line trains passing while we were grilling in the backyard or viewing it from my father’s former room.