At 7:00pm that evening, the subway opened to the public, and more than 100,000 people paid a nickel each for their first ride. Out to fulfill its promise of “City Hall to Harlem in 15 minutes,” the first train departed with New York City Mayor George B. On October 27, 1904, New York’s Interborough Rapid Transit (IRT) system opened, running approximately nine miles from City Hall downtown north to Grand Central Terminal, then west to Times Square and up to 145th Street. in 1897) stepped forward to fund the project. (who also endorsed Samuel Sachs with Kleinwort, Sons & Co.
Eventually, a financier from a prominent New York banking family named August Belmont, Jr. While the Commissioners of the city’s Board of Rapid Transit lobbied for much needed financial backing for a subway system, few potential investors found it an attractive proposition given that the new thoroughfare would be under municipal control. Now New York looked beneath its streets for a potential solution. London had already operated an underground transit system since 1863, and Boston opened the United States’ first subway in 1897. The earliest of these was constructed in the late 1860s.Īs elevated train tracks sprang up across the city, it became clear to city planners that an alternative was needed to stay ahead of New York’s demand for mass transit and to assist development in some of the farther reaches of the city. As the streets of the long, narrow island of Manhattan became more congested, elevated railways were erected to provide rapid public transportation around the city. In 1904, the New York City subway system opens at City Hall, launching a new era in mass transit in one of the world’s largest cities.Īt the turn of the twentieth century, New York City was the largest city in the United States, bustling with commerce, industry and a growing population.
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