WELL, it’s only taken 25 years, but I finally have a pair of remaining iron trolley poles to talk about in the Bronx. During my Bronx presentation for the Bronx County Historical Society, Bronx historian Tom Casey pointed out the locations of a pair of these items, which once carried overhead wires supplying power to trolley cars that ran on tracks embedded in the street.
The first is located on the SE corner of Webster Avenue and East 204th Street in front of a new office building at #3100. Ironically I have been here before as some years ago, I exited Bronx Park over a pedestrian bridge at East 204th atop Metro North tracks; however, I failed to notice it.
That trolley pole shows up in this 1940 photo of the same corner, carrying trolley wire and power lines in front of the railcar-style Billmore Diner. No such railcar diners remain in NYC, but there were quite a few of them in 1940.
The second is located on Fort Independence Street just west of Sedgwick…
… And again, it shows up, but just barely, in this 1940 tax photo shot, complete with tracks and trolley wire. Most of NYC’s streetcar lines were eliminated between 1945 and 1951. The building on the corner is heavily covered with weather siding, but the building on Sedgwick still looks very similar to what it looked like 80 years ago.
Thx Tom Casey for page info.
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12/16/24
4 comments
Thank you for your Bronx Tour last night and getting this story out to other enthusiasts.
I believe that the last trolley line to run in New York was over the Queensboro Bridge and connecting to Roosevelt Island. It was sometime in the spring of ‘56 or ‘57. I recall riding on one in Brooklyn I think in ‘55 or ‘56.
I take it that this former trolley pole is the only survivor there seeing that just about everything around it has changed beyond recognition of what was there originally.
The tracks at Fort Independence St. and Sedgwick Ave. carried the University Avenue trolley route. It was converted to bus in 1947 and still operates on the same exact route today, known as BX3 University Avenue. South terminal is at George Washington Bridge Bus Station at 179th Street; north terminal is 238th St. and Broadway.