The New York herald., 1877-07-11
No steam On w..t street.


A report was yesterday submitted to the
Board Of Aldermen by the Committee on
Streets adverse to the proposition to al
low the Belt Horse Car Railroad to be
used as steam freight line between the
hours of nino o'clock in the evening and
six o'clock in the morning, The argu-
ment of the committee is mainly based
on the fact that freight trains on the
Belt line road even if only run between
the hours of nine in the evening and six in
the morning, would blockade during those
hours all the ferries on the North River,
many on the East River and all the avenues
intersected by Fifty-ninth street While the
resolution under consideration affected
to give oil railroad lines running
into the city equal rights, it is
we'll known that no trunk road except
the New York Central could possibly avail
itself of the privilege. The real object
of the resolution was, in fact, to enable the
Hudson River road to run it's freight
cars down to pier 27, ut Barclay
street. ON the Belt line rails along
West street instead OF taking them down
from Thirtieth street, as at present, on
floats. 1t is thought one thousand tons per
day might be thus transported from the
upper to the lower part of tho city. But to
move this amount of freight would require
one hundred cars carrying ten tons each,
and as each car would take half an hour to
unload, it Can readily be seen that West
street would be crowded with freight cars
during the designated hours, if not during
the greater part of the day.
Freight is brought into and carried out of
New York by way of the North River docks
and piers between Canal street and the
Battery by the Erie, the Pennsylvania
Central, tho Delaware. Lackawanna and
Western and the New Jersey Central rail-
roads. and by the Fall River, Providence,
Stonington, Peoples and Troy lines OF
steamboats,. besides other lines of Transport
tation. A large proportion of the market
wagons and milk wagons come into the city
from the Jersey side. All of these have to
cross the West street railroad. Then,
again, express trains from the West and
South arrive and 60 out on all the lines
terminating on the Jersey shore between
the hours during which it is proposed to
turn the Belt line into a freight railroad.
The passage to the ferries would be block
AIDED by the West street freight trains.
The cars of all the avenue horse car lines
would be impeded and blocked at Fifty
ninth street by the freight trains crossing
the city from First to Tenth avenue at that
spot. The conclusion is that for the sake
of accommodating the transportation of at
most ono thousand tons of freight, between
Thirtieth street and Barclay street. an
obstruction would be raised against the
handling and moving Of some eight thou
sand tons Of freight arriving in the city by
other channels. while in addition local
travel would be interrupted, private busi-
ness destroyed and private property seri-
ously injured.
The committee, whil2 reporting against
the resolution, declare in favor Of q dock
line Of elevated freight railroad Us a perma-
nent relief to commerce, and do not oppose
the connection of docks above Canal street
with the New York Central Railroad freight
lines as temporary relief